With the DOE’s weekly energy report being released just moments ago, here are some highlights:
>Refinery Utilization… YES!! Finally! 91.3% of capacity. This is JUST what we needed to slow the rise in gas prices!
>Gasoline Demand… rose 0.4% compared to the same time last year, which is quite surprising… last year we had (I’m sure you remember) very “cheap” gasoline (in fact, it bottomed out UNDER $2). Demand GREW this year with prices being nearly $1.50 more per gallon? What is going on America!?
>Oil inventories… Not good… dropped by nearly 7 million barrels. We’re looking at nearly 30 million barrels less of oil than just months ago. This number is significant and MAY support $100 oil
>Gasoline inventories… GOOD! Rose by over 5 million barrels to put us in the important ABOVE AVERAGE range for the first time in months! This will help slow the rise in retail prices.
>Distillate inventories (diesel and heating oil)… Good! Rose by 1.5 million barrels to bring them to the lower half of the average range.
We had, in my mind, a good DOE report, but the bulls might initiate another round of $100 oil as we start to see the effects of a loss in oil supply from OPEC. We really need OPEC to boost production now before we run into a bigger situation when spring rolls around!
Look for oil to distance itself from gasoline today.
Oil will trade higher, gasoline should fall. We’ll see!
Patrick
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