Oil Rig Count Dropped by 2 Last Week, Hedge Funds Take a Breather

Energy

Published: May 28, 2016 9:10 am

Last Updated: January 13, 2020 7:27 am

In the week ended May 27, the number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States totaled 316, down two compared with the prior week and a total of 646 a year ago. Including 87 other rigs drilling for natural gas, there are a total of 404 working rigs in the country, unchanged week over week and down 471 year over year. There is also one rig listed as “miscellaneous.” The data come from the latest Baker Hughes Inc. (NYSE: BHI) North American Rotary Rig Count released on Friday.

West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil for July delivery traded down up about 0.2% on Friday to settle at $49.56, up about 2.4% for the week. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported last Wednesday that crude supplies had decreased by 4.2 million barrels in the week ended May 20 and that gasoline supplies had risen by 2 million barrels.

Soon-to-be-anointed Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump traveled to North Dakota last Thursday to deliver a major speech on energy policy. He made four central points:

American energy dominance will be declared a strategic economic and foreign policy goal of the U.S.

[The U.S.] will become, and stay, totally independent of any need to import energy from the OPEC cartel or any nations hostile to [its] interests.

[A Trump administration] will use the revenues from energy production to rebuild [American] roads, schools, bridges and public infrastructure.

[A Trump administration] will get the bureaucracy out of the way of innovation, so we can pursue all forms of energy.

Trump also promised to rescind the Obama administration’s Climate Action Plan and the Waters of the U.S. rule; save the coal industry; approve the Keystone XL pipeline; lift moratoria on energy production from federal lands; revoke policies limiting new drilling technologies; and cancel the Paris Climate Agreement and stop paying United Nations dues that are directed at global warming programs.

The number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States is down by 330 year over year and down by two week over week. The natural gas rig count rose by two rigs to 87. The count for natural gas rigs is down by 138 year over year. Natural gas for July delivery closed the week at $2.17 per million BTUs, down nearly 2% compared with the prior week. The low price for natural gas over the past 12 months is $1.94 per million BTUs.

U.S. refineries ran at 89.7% of capacity, a week-over-week decrease of about 92,000 barrels a day. Imports fell by about 362,000 barrels a day, to around 7.3 million barrels a day in the week.

Hedge funds — under the Managed Money heading in the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) weekly Commitments of Traders report — dropped 1,909 short contracts last week and also dumped 12,750 long contracts. The movement reflects changes as of the May 24 settlement date. Managed money holds 281,321 long positions, compared with 70,336 short positions. Open interest totaled 1,657,419. There were 44 hedge funds with large short positions last week, up by two compared with the prior week. Although longs outnumber shorts by about four to one, hedge funds last week seemed to be betting that it is too early to declare that $50 crude is here to stay.

Among the producers themselves, short positions outnumber longs by nearly three to two, 451,584 to 164,234. The number of short positions fell by 34,562 contracts last week, and longs dropped by 26,619 positions. Positions among swaps dealers show 259,055 short contracts versus 204,663 long positions. Swaps dealers dropped 16,330 contracts from their short positions last week and dropped 14,556 long positions.

Among the states, Alaska, Kansas and North Dakota each lost one rig. Oklahoma added two and Louisiana and Ohio each added one new rig.

In the Permian Basin of west Texas and southeastern New Mexico, the rig count remained unchanged at 137. The Eagle Ford Basin in south Texas dropped two rigs for a new total of 29, and the Williston Basin (Bakken) in North Dakota and Montana now has 22 working rigs, down one compared with the prior week.

Enterprise Products Partners L.P. (NYSE: EPD) lists a posted price of $45.27 per barrel for WTI and a May 28 price of $46.22 a barrel for Eagle Ford crude. The price for both varieties rose by $1.07 a barrel over the past week. Crude has gained more than $4.00 a barrel in the past three weeks. Enterprise has not posted a price for North Dakota Light Sweet for the past six weeks.

The pump price of gasoline rose by about 1.9% week over week. Saturday morning’s average price in the United States was $2.322 a gallon, up from $2.279 a week ago. The year-ago price was $2.739 a gallon.