According to the "First Financial Daily" report, the international oil price plummeted, with US gasoline 0.73 USD/liter and water/kloc-0 USD/liter. Oil is cheaper than water. It seems that the happy moment of American aunt has arrived.
Since this summer, international crude oil prices have plummeted by 30% to the lowest point in four years. As of 2 17 pm Beijing time, London Brent crude oil futures price hovered around $78.4 per barrel, which continued to fall from the previous day. Analysts are still shouting: there is no minimum, only lower. Some experts even predict that this round of decline will reach $50/barrel.
On June 3rd165438+1October 65438 local time, the futures price of light crude oil for February delivery in the New York Mercantile Exchange closed at 74.2 1 USD per barrel, which fell below the $75 mark, the lowest since September 20th10. London Brent crude oil futures for February delivery closed at $77.92 a barrel, also falling to the lowest level in four years.
The "fall" of international oil prices has been transmitted to the United States, and American refined oil products have fallen below $3 per gallon (about 3.8 liters) for the first time since 20 10.
Economists have analyzed that this round of American economic growth has almost reached its peak, and the slowdown in overseas demand has dragged down exports, which may turn the economy downward; However, the sudden sharp price reduction of gasoline may be a big plus for stimulating domestic consumption. The New York Times predicted that the sharp drop in gasoline prices in the past few weeks will bring billions of dollars in additional retail revenue to the United States in the coming consumption season.
According to the analysis, for those low-and middle-income American consumers, the decline in gasoline prices is particularly important. These people have not recovered from the economic recovery in the past few years. Although the job market has improved in recent years, the wage growth of most workers has been negligible in recent years. As for those groups with the most financial difficulties, they can relax a little from this gasoline price reduction and transfer their expenses to other daily life or service expenses.
At present, Americans spend $654.38 billion on gasoline every day. The price reduction of gasoline will save American consumers $8.4 billion in June 5438+065438+ 10 and February this year compared with the same period last year. According to the calculation that a typical American family buys 1200 gallons (about 4542 liters) of gasoline every year, the current gasoline price will save them at least $400 a year. At the same time, the price of household fuel has also decreased by 15% compared with the same period of last year, which is another additional savings that will be brought by the downward adjustment of oil prices.
In fact, the United States is not short of oil. Last Thursday, the weekly inventory report released by the US Department of Energy showed that US crude oil production has risen to the highest level in 29 years: 9 million barrels per day. According to this output, the United States is almost equivalent to Saudi Arabia with a daily output of 9.6 million barrels.
According to the report, the rise of oil production in the United States is inseparable from the application of new energy technologies: millions of tons of oil and gas have been extracted from shale; Several key oil pipelines have been updated and upgraded, and oil transportation from the central plains of the United States to the Gulf of Mexico has been redistributed. This change has almost filled the warehouses of smelters near the Gulf of Mexico with crude oil stocks. The United States has ended the era of importing crude oil from Nigeria and other West African countries.
But to add fuel to the fire, in the face of this round of oil price decline, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) has not cut production, and the recovery of Libyan oil production has aggravated the oversupply; At the same time, although the situation in Iraq is still turbulent, the country's oil exports have set a record since the Iraq war.
Members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries even took the opportunity to wage a big price war. Saudi Arabia recently lowered the official selling price of crude oil exported to the United States, which touched a sensitive nerve for market share. However, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), which used to be "everything", is losing the pricing power of crude oil. John Kordov believes that Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iran all place their hopes on China and other major crude oil customers in Asia, but the competition in Asia is also fierce. In September this year, crude oil produced on the northern slope of Alaska in the United States began to be exported to South Korea.
On the one hand, the supply exceeds expectations, on the other hand, the demand is getting weaker and weaker. Due to the lower-than-expected global economic recovery, the report released by the International Energy Agency in June of 5438+00 lowered the daily average growth forecast of global crude oil demand in 20 14 and 20 15 years by 250,000 barrels and 90,000 barrels respectively. In addition, the Federal Reserve announced its withdrawal from quantitative easing at the end of 10, which brought a new round of strength to the US dollar. The US dollar index recently hit a five-year high, and the prices of commodities such as crude oil denominated in US dollars will continue to be suppressed.
Next March, US oil production may further rise to 9.5 million barrels per day, or even higher. As the winter passes, the global oil consumption market will also fall into a downturn, and oil prices will continue to bottom out. Last Friday, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russia was ready to face a "catastrophic" drop in oil prices.
Where is the bottom of the oil price? What are the factors that affect oil prices?
According to the analysis of Huaxia Energy Network, there are five factors that can affect the international oil price at present:
1, output of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries
From mid-June, international oil prices began to enter the downward channel. There are three specific sources: First, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries increased production by about 600,000 barrels per day, mainly from Libya, and other countries generally increased or decreased; Second, US crude oil production increased by nearly 300,000 barrels per day; Third, the three major energy institutions have continuously lowered their demand expectations by about 300,000 barrels per day. The decline in oil prices caused by oversupply has the greatest impact on exporting countries, especially the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.
Therefore, in recent days, the highest news level in the crude oil market has pointed to the output trend of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. 165438+ The meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries will be held on127 October, but there are different opinions in the market at present, and it is still inconclusive whether to cut production in the end.
At present, international oil prices have caused financial problems for most OPEC members. Therefore, it is considered that it is more likely that OPEC will eventually limit production and protect prices. Even if the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries does not reduce the output quota of 30 million barrels per day, it can achieve the effect of reducing production as long as it requires its member countries to strictly abide by the quota. At present, the overall output of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries is about 30.8 million barrels per day, which exceeds the quota by nearly one million barrels.
If the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries announces the production restriction at the June165438+1October meeting, the situation of oversupply in the crude oil market will be greatly improved, a mountain that has been suppressing crude oil for a long time will be removed, and the international oil price will rebound rapidly, which is expected to return to above $90/barrel.
2. American shale oil production
From the perspective of crude oil production cost, unconventional oil and gas assets are among the high costs. The average cost of shale oil mining in the United States is about $65/barrel. But for some small and medium shale oil companies, the cost may be as high as 75-80 dollars. Therefore, if the price of crude oil in the United States falls below $80/barrel, some production enterprises will face an economic test, followed by the problem of reducing production.
3. European and American sanctions against Iran
165438+1the deadline for Iranian nuclear talks will come on October 24th, and the two sides will continue to confront each other around the nuclear issue to decide whether they will make concessions to each other. But recently, Obama said that "the differences are still very big, and I'm afraid I can't reach my goal." Earlier, the United Nations Security Council imposed four rounds of sanctions on Iran, and Europe and the United States unilaterally deepened the sanctions against Iraq. At present, Europe and America allow Iran to export no more than 1 10,000 barrels of oil every day. The negotiation result is unlikely to reach the final result.
4, the role of the futures market
In the past five months, due to the continuous release of bad news in the crude oil market, the bearish atmosphere in the futures market is also heating up, and there has been a rare wave of shorting. Take US crude oil futures as an example. Since July, the net long positions of US crude oil futures and options held by traders have decreased by 53%, of which long positions have decreased by 32%, while short positions have surged by11%in the same period! Although the bearish atmosphere in the crude oil futures market has not been substantially improved, there is a phenomenon that needs to be vigilant.
5. Situation of oil-producing countries
Geopolitical tensions, such as the military conflict between Russia and Ukraine, the "Islamic State" violence in the Middle East and the internal turmoil in Libya, are still active in the oil market. Russia-Ukraine relations are caught in a tug-of-war, and with the coming of winter, the problem of natural gas supply will increase Russia's chips, and territorial and energy trade disputes are still expected to be difficult to eradicate; Although the tension in the Middle East has eased recently, the "Islamic State" is still intermittently provoking market nerves, and its potential risk factors cannot be ignored; Libya's civil strife tends to be long-term, and Libya's oil fields and ports are frequently opened and closed under the interference of internal separatist forces, so the output growth still faces great challenges.
Factors such as the sharp drop in oil prices, territorial disputes and civil strife are likely to escalate the above geopolitical risks on a large scale. Once the situation escalates, crude oil futures prices will react quickly. However, due to the relative oversupply in the overall market, it will weaken the concerns of tight supply caused by geopolitical tensions, so its impact is relatively small.
Conspiracy theory prevails: the United States and Saudi Arabia want to "kill" Russia.
Anything that happens in the oil industry can be explained by conspiracy theories. The recent plunge in oil prices is no exception.
According to Phoenix Finance, thomas l. friedman's article on conspiracy theories was recently published in The New York Times's editorial. The former Middle East journalist asked in a recent column, "Is this my fantasy? Or did the global oil war really break out? On the one hand, the United States and Saudi Arabia, and on the other hand, Russia and Iran. " Then he asked himself, "Yes", and thought that the United States and Saudi Arabia wanted to kill their rivals Iran and Russia, which mainly rely on oil income. At the same time, conspiracy theories are also very popular in Russia.
The important news of Pravda in Russia is: "Obama wants Saudi Arabia to destroy our economy".
In fact, Saudi Arabia is the largest oil producer with overcapacity and has always been a force controlling the oil market. When there is a bubble in oil prices, Saudi Arabia will increase production to curb price increases, and when prices fall, it will reduce production to support the market. At the end of this summer, oil prices began to plummet, and the market generally expected Saudi Arabia to cut production as usual. However, contrary to expectations, Saudi Arabia announced last month that it would strive to "maintain market share" and would not cut production to support oil prices.
Although people can't help but interpret Saudi Arabia's approach from a political perspective, its strategy can also be explained by multiple economic reasons. The most obvious reason is that for Saudi Arabia, the United States is no longer an extremely embarrassing political ally. In the past, the United States has been importing a lot of Saudi crude oil, but now there has been a "Yeyan Oil Revolution", and the United States has changed from a big customer of Saudi Arabia to a major competitor.
Because the production cost of shale oil is higher than that of Saudi Arabia, one of the strategies to deal with competition is to lower the oil price and force shale oil producers to withdraw from the market. At present, Saudi Arabia has been unable to use this tactic, because for many supply and political factors, the oil price has been higher than the production cost of Yeyan oil. In recent months, the supply in the global oil market has unexpectedly increased, but the demand has fallen sharply. Oil prices have fallen by about 25% since June, and even fell below $80 a barrel last week.
If Saudi Arabia cuts production to support prices now, the United States can expand the production of leaf oil to hit its key points, and the Arabian Peninsula will inevitably end up with a decrease in crude oil revenue. The only strategy that Saudi Arabia can adopt at present is to force the United States to become another supplier of crude oil. If this statement is correct, it will be of great significance. This means that the decline in oil prices will not be a short-lived phenomenon, but a frequent price war between the two major crude oil suppliers in the world, which will become the basic pattern of the global oil market.
Of course, some people say that conspiracy theories are far-fetched.
Netease Finance's report pointed out that many people naturally think that the relationship between finance and political structure is profound, but the change of supply and demand is the ultimate goal of all external factors, and the weak economic recovery and the declining dependence of the world on crude oil energy are the driving forces for its gradual decline to 80 US dollars/barrel.
According to reports, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) lowered its global economic growth forecast from 3.4% to 3.3% last week, and the economic weakness is still obvious; The International Energy Agency (IEA) lowered its forecast for the daily growth of oil demand this year from 700,000 barrels to 200,000 barrels, the lowest in five years. However, it should be noted that the reduction of energy prices will not only bring negative effects. In the difficult period of economic recovery, the benefits of reducing energy costs to industry are obvious.
With the development of technology, the world's dependence on crude oil is far less important than it was during the oil crisis in the last century. In addition, the improvement of mining capacity in various countries and the rapid development of alternative energy sources, as well as the shale oil invested and developed by the United States for a long time, began to enter a period of rapid output growth. As a result, in September this year, the average daily crude oil production in the United States increased by 13% year-on-year to 8.8 million barrels, and it will soon surpass Saudi Arabia to become the world's largest crude oil producer. Therefore, the data of OPEC's monopoly control ability show that at present, the crude oil produced by non-OPEC countries accounts for more than 50% of the world crude oil trade, while it was less than 30% in the1970s. In addition, it is difficult for OPEC and non-OPEC countries to coordinate their actions, and members of OPEC often disagree.
As we all know, Russian finance is very dependent on oil revenue. Russia sells 7.2 million barrels of crude oil to the international market every day, accounting for 45% of Russia's fiscal revenue, and its fiscal profit line is about $0/02 per barrel. If the price of crude oil remains at $90/barrel, Russia's fiscal revenue will decrease by10.5% in 20 15 years, and the harm of falling oil prices is indeed reflected. However, according to the cost of US shale oil of US$ 85/barrel, it is almost inevitable that US shale oil producers will fall into losses, and 2 million people will participate in employment. "If you hurt the enemy, you will lose 800?" This is not what the Obama administration wants to see.
What benefits did the eight-day drop in oil prices bring to the people?
Affected by the continuous sharp drop in international oil prices, the National Development and Reform Commission announced the downward adjustment of refined oil prices again yesterday. Since July 22 this year, domestic oil prices have achieved a rare "eight-day losing streak". After the implementation of this price adjustment, since July 22nd, the retail prices of No.90 gasoline and No.0 diesel have decreased by1.1yuan and 1.25 yuan, respectively, and the domestic retail prices of gasoline and diesel have generally fallen back to the "6 yuan era".
So, what benefits can the "eight-day losing streak" bring to the people?
1。 According to the Southern Metropolis Daily, the fuel consumption cost of private cars has dropped significantly. For example, if you run 2000 kilometers per month and consume 8L fuel per 100 kilometers, the price adjustment will reduce the fuel consumption cost of private car owners by 23 yuan per month. If calculated by the cumulative decline of "eight-day losing streak", the total monthly fuel consumption will be reduced by about 185 yuan.
2。 Reduce prices and stimulate consumption. Low oil prices benefit taxi, aviation, tourism and other industries, reduce the travel costs of ordinary consumers and indirectly stimulate consumption.
3。 The national crude oil import cost is reduced. New york oil price hit a new low since 20110; Brent oil price in London hit a new low of 20 10 since September. 20 13 5438+00 June, China surpassed the United States to become the world's largest oil importer. According to experts' analysis, if the annual average price of international crude oil drops by 10, China will save 20 billion dollars in import costs.
4。 Indirectly stimulate economic growth. When China's economic growth slows down, falling oil prices can reduce economic operating costs, thus stimulating economic growth and transformation and upgrading.