WTI $42.43 -$1.07, Brent $49.22 -44c, Diff $6.99 +63c, NG $2.79 -14c

Oil price

Another bad day particularly for WTI, as domestic pressures in the US are at present creating an unpleasant backdrop and the chart looks very wobbly indeed. The dollar strengthened on the back of retail sales and employment data but it was towards China that most heads were turned. The Yuan has lost over 4% this week although it has steadied a bit this morning as the PBOC has been heavily intervening selling dollars to buy their own currency. Memories are indeed short as it doesn’t seem that long ago that we were being warned about how much of the greenback that they owned, now they are forced sellers… On this note it is interesting to see whether they would be buying crude oil, something I have talked about a number of times recently when the commodity has a bad spell. Whilst it is fair to suggest that the weakness of the Yuan has made crude more expensive it has still fallen massively more than the currency and I wouldn't be surprised to see some buying had occurred when we see the August figures.

WTI was also hit by the Genscape numbers that showed stocks at Cushing rose by 1.3m barrels in the week to the 11th of August, at this rate we will have an agency reporting stock levels every day… The refinery outages I have talked about aren’t going to make life easier, Whiting which is the biggest refinery in the Mid-West may be substantially out for over a month plus two or three others and also don't forget that the driving season is coming to an end meaning a significant fall in refinery runs in September and October. WTI is at a critical level on the chart, yesterday’s low point was $41.91 and any self-respecting chartist will tell you that if we don-t hold here the next price might start with a 3…

WTI 8 year chart

Afren - There are more questions than answers…

The situation at Afren appears to get worse and I can't help but feel that there is something very suspicious going on here. I read with interest that leading oil trader Gunvor has expressed an interest in some of Afren’s African assets which must be good news for the investors who may lose everything. However I also note that…

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