January 27th, 2011 by Belisarius
Crude oil stocks rose 4.8 million barrels; Gasoline stocks increased 2.4 million barrels; Distillate stocks fell 0.1 million barrels; Propane/propylene stocks were down 3.3 million barrels; Other oils stocks decreased 2.1 million barrels; Total crude oil and petroleum stocks were 2.4 million barrels higher for the week.
Refinery utilization fell 1.2% to 81.8%.
Implied crude oil demand rose 0.2 million barrels.
Crude oil and petroleum product net imports rose 0.2 million barrels to 9.7 million barrels.
Crude oil stocks rising, markets well supplied, demand weak.
Recent weeks are marked by record WTI vs. Brent crude price spread which is at record high of 11.2 USD per barrel. My best guess is that this is caused by three major factors: oversupplied U.S. market, smaller negative roll yield in Brent (or even positive roll on some contracts), coming CFTC futures position limits.
What this means for the crude oil price? I would say WTI is better proxy for oil price than Brent.
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January 26th, 2011 by Belisarius
New: Formulation that despite rise in commodity prices longer-term inflation expectations have remained stable and; Since Mr. Hoenig in no longer a voting member all FOMC members voted in favor of FOMC monetary policy action.
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January 26th, 2011 by Belisarius
U.S. new home sales rose 17.5% to 329.000 SAAR; Consensus was at 300.000 SAAR, prior reading (revised downward 10.000) was at 280.000 SAAR.
Month of supplies fell from 8.4 down to 6.9 months. Backlog of unsold new homes is at 191.000, lowest since February 1968.
As I wrote yesterday, months of supply is still above pre-crisis levels, but the absolute level of unsold new homes is so low that small pickup in new home sales could lead to demand outweighing supply.
If inflow of foreclosed homes to the market does not increase dramatically the possibility of further large-scale decreases of home prices is not high. I will monitor situation closely as home prices are crucial for financial sector health.
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January 26th, 2011 by Belisarius
*** The Slope Of Hope: Time Saver ***
*** The Slope Of Hope: Food Inflation- More Than Meets the Eye ***
*** Daily Options Report: Fading VIX Breakouts ***
*** FT Alphaville: A very messy Ambac lawsuit for JPMorgan ***
*** FT Alphaville: Searching for BoE credibility on inflation ***
*** FT Alphaville: WTI’s upcoming ‘Keystone’ problem ***
*** Self-Evident: Far from the madding crowd ***
*** Pragmatic Capitalism: IS QE ACTUALLY WORKING? ***
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January 26th, 2011 by Belisarius
MBA mortgage applications fell 12.9%; Prior reading was an increase of 5.0%; On year level MBA Basic Index is down 13.9%.
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January 25th, 2011 by Belisarius
Richmond FED Manufacturing Survey was reported today at 18.0. Prior reading was at 25.0, consensus was at 22.0.
To repeat: Industrial production will continue to slowly expand in January.
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January 25th, 2011 by Belisarius
Conference Board consumer confidence came out at 60.6 vs. 54.3 consensus and 52.5 reading for December.
Large positive surprise.
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January 25th, 2011 by Belisarius
Seasonly adjusted S&P/Case-Shiller HPI 10 city composite fell 0.4% In November; On year level 10 city index is down 0.4%.
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January 25th, 2011 by Belisarius
Moody’s/REAL National Commercial Property Index rose 0.6% in November and it is now running at +2.8% y-o-y.
Levitating around bottom.
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January 25th, 2011 by Belisarius
*** Pragmatic Capitalism: AN EARLY EARNINGS UPDATE ***
*** The Big Picture: Market’s topped out for now ***
*** FT BeyondBRICs: A chart for the China bears ***
*** FT Alphaville: Ugly UK GDP figures ***
*** FT Alphaville: Come one, come all, to the EFSF bond issue ***
*** FT Alphaville: John Paulson’s real 2010 success: Gold ***
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January 24th, 2011 by Belisarius
*** The Atlantic: Picture of the Day: Shanghai in 1990 and 2010 ***
*** Market Folly: David Tepper Interview: “I Am Cautious But I Am Optimistic” ***
*** The Big Picture: Is China an ‘Enormous Tail-Risk’? ***
*** The Big Picture: There Goes the Neighborhood Correlation! ***
*** The Big Picture: Gold net longs hit lowest since July ’09 ***
*** FT Alphaville: Correlation trading and the WTI-Brent spread ***
*** FT BeyondBRICs: Why the market is wrong about China ***
*** Forexlive: California Treasurer Says No Way States Enter Bankruptcy ***
*** The Slope Of Hope: Major Commodities Top? ***
*** The Slope Of Hope: Commodities At 50% Retracement ***
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January 24th, 2011 by Belisarius
Baltic dry index fell 4.8% last week; Capesize Index was down 2.4%; Panamax Index fell 14.2%; Supramax Index rose 2.4%; Handysize Index was up 1.6%.
Iron ore stockpiles in Chinese ports at all-time high, iron ore demand will be weaker because of lunar new year (February 3rd). All this looks quite negative for dry bulk rates.
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January 24th, 2011 by Belisarius
Weekly economic calendar.
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January 23rd, 2011 by Belisarius
Number of crude oil drilling rigs rose for 9; Number of natural gas drilling rigs fell for 4.
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January 23rd, 2011 by Belisarius
Baltic Dirty Tanker Index fell 7.6%; Baltic Clean Tanker Index rose 0.2%.
My comment remains the same: too many available ships for the cargoes offered. From the crude oil demand side it also feels the bullishness from the end of the last year has abated.
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