The July Brent futures flat price has been well-supported this morning, rising from its low of $82.40/bbl at 06:40 BST to a peak of $83.20/bbl at 10:20 BST. Following this, it has seen a slight tick down into $82.90/bbl handles, where it currently resides as of 11:15 BST (time of writing). Crude production figures from February reveal that Saudi Arabia and Iraq have seen steep y-o-y declines of 1.4mbbls/d and 347kbbls/d, respectively, whilst the US has increased its production y-o-y by 744kbbls/d. Middle Eastern diesel exports to Europe have risen to a 10-month high to average 531kbbls/d in April, as Russian product has mostly headed to Turkey, Brazil and Africa. Nigeria’s NNPC has announced 40kbbls/d of expected additional oil output in the next two weeks after the company’s exploration arm began production at Oil Mining Lease (OML) 13 in the Niger Delta region. Russia’s Rosgeo agency has found an estimated 511,000mbbls of oil and gas reserves in British Antarctic Territory, around ten times the North Sea’s entire 50-year output. The territory is already subject to competing claims from Argentina and Chile, which may intensify if the evidence from Rosgeo’s seismic surveys is proven by subsequent drilling. Finally, in an attempt to safeguard the US’ EV manufacturers, Joe Biden is poised to announce an increase in tariffs on Chinese EV imports from 25% to 102.5%. The front and 6-month spreads are $0.41/bbl and $3.03/bbl, respectively.
