Oil Prices Remain Rangebound as Geopolitical Catalysts Loom

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Oil prices have been range-bound after weeks of wild swings, with both positioning data and traded volumes indicating traders are taking a breather to assess where Brent futures would be moving next. With Brent at $65 per barrel and WTI at $62.5 per barrel, the next big pricing move might come from the Russia-Ukraine or US-Iran negotiations.

China’s crude refinery throughput declined by 1.3% from a year ago and averaged 14.12 million b/d last month, with consultants estimating that utilisation rates were as low as 73.8%, the lowest in the country’s post-COVID recovery period, OilPrices.com reports.

Nine years after the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union, London signed a defence and trade treaty with Brussels, opening up each other’s waters for fishing for 12 years, easing agricultural exports and facilitating arms investments.

Russia detained a Greek tanker after it left Estonia’s port of Sillamae and crossed into Russian territorial waters, four days after the Baltic country’s navy attempted to stop a Russia-bound oil tanker for being part of the ‘shadow fleet’.

The Indonesian Attorney General’s Office reached out to a number of trading firms in Singapore to investigate corruption in its state oil and gas company Pertamina, alleging that fraudulent oil import deals caused $12 billion in lost government revenue.

Turkish explorer TPAO has discovered a new offshore gas field containing at least 75 billion cubic metres (2.6 Tcf) in the Black Sea, adding to the 400 bcm Sakarya field as Ankara doubles down on domestic exploration, still importing 90% of its energy needs.

Fears of US-Canada trade frictions have led Canadian oil exporters to focus primarily on China with their TMX barrels, sending 226,000 b/d of heavy sour crude (or 55% of all exports) to Chinese refiners, with Sinopec emerging as the largest buyer.

Following five lengthy years of arbitration, the International Court of Justice ruled in favor of Equatorial Guinea in its territorial dispute with Gabon, awarding it the Mbanie, Cocotiers and Conga islands, located in the oil-rich waters in the Gulf of Guinea.

Copper inventories in warehouses controlled by the Shanghai Futures Exchange rebounded sharply this week after weeks of continuous declines driven by strong US-bound export flows, jumping 34% week-on-week to 108,142 metric tonnes, marking the end of destocking.

Having failed to attract any bids for its biggest ever offshore wind tender in late 2024, Denmark plans to launch its 2025 offering with two areas in the Danish North Sea, willing to dole out government subsidies for new developments worth $8.3 billion.

As US sanctions were snapped back on Venezuela, the Latin American country’s state oil firm PDVSA has begun exporting the heavy Boscan grade itself, produced at the Petroboscan JV that US oil major Chevron (NYSE:CVX) used to operate.

Japanese steel giant Nippon Steel (TYO:5401) vowed to invest up to $4 billion in a new US steel mill should the Trump administration approve its $14 billion takeover of US Steel (NYSE:X), ahead of the May 21 deadline for the completion of its national security review.

The European Commission will propose to lower the current $60 per barrel oil price cap to $50 per barrel in this week’s meeting of G7 finance ministers, as lower outright prices are now keeping Russian barrels sanctions-compliant even without using the ‘shadow fleet’.

After re-electing Shell CEO (LON:SHEL) Wael Sawan, the annual general meeting of the London-based energy major poured cold water on market speculation about a potential BP merger, saying the bar for M&A deals is very high, preferring to put money into share buybacks.