Oil Rig Count Up by 6 Last Week, Hedge Funds Turn Long on Crude, Distillates

Energy

Published: July 16, 2016 9:50 am

Last Updated: January 13, 2020 5:39 am

In the week ended July 15, the number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States totaled 357, up by six compared with the prior week and a total of 638 a year ago. Including 89 other rigs drilling for natural gas and one rig listed as “miscellaneous,” there are a total of 447 working rigs in the country, up seven week over week and down 410 year over year. 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 August delivery traded up about 1.3% on Friday to settle at $46.28, up nearly 2% for the week, after posting a weekly high of $46.93 on Tuesday. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported last Thursday that crude supplies had decreased by 2.5 million barrels in the week ended July 8 and that gasoline supplies had risen by 1.2 million barrels.

Although the International Energy Agency (IEA) said last week that the oil market is on its way to rebalancing, the agency also said that the rebalancing was not going to happen in the third quarter of 2016. U.S. crude oil stockpiles have dropped by nearly 14 million barrels since the end of May. The less good news for producers is that last week’s inventory of nearly 522 million barrels is still nearly 60 million barrels higher than the top of the five-year average range.

The U.S. gasoline stockpile was about 500,000 barrels higher on July 8 than it was on June 3, and more than 22 million barrels higher than at the same time in 2015. The gasoline glut is the result of a warm winter that caused refiners to reduce production of distillates like diesel fuel and heating oil and raise production of gasoline. For the first quarter of 2016, refiners’ yields on gasoline were higher than they were a year ago, while yields on distillates were lower. Refining yields are beginning to flip now, as forecasts for a colder winter and a slow increase in demand for freight are sending refiners a signal to produce more distillates and less gasoline.

The number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States is down by 281 year over year and up week over week by six. The natural gas rig count increased by one to 89. The count for natural gas rigs is down by 129 year over year. Natural gas for August delivery closed the week at $2.76 per million BTUs, down about 6 cents compared with the prior week.

U.S. refineries ran at 92.3% of capacity, a week-over-week decrease of about 143,000 barrels a day. Imports fell by about 522,000 barrels a day, to around 7.8 million barrels a day in the week.

Hedge funds — under the Managed Money heading in the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s (CFTC) weekly Commitments of Traders report — dumped 3,511 short contracts for WTI crude oil last week, and added 5,653 long contracts. The movement reflects changes as of the July 12 settlement date. Managed money holds 283,738 long positions compared with 129,209 short positions. Open interest totaled 1,728,765. There were 51 hedge funds with large short positions last week, down by 10 compared with the prior week.

Hedge funds have built a large long position in heating oil, according to a report at Reuters, and a somewhat bearish view on gasoline. The hedgies are sending a strong message to refiners to lower gasoline production in favor of distillates, and the refiners have begun to pay attention.

Among the producers themselves, short positions outnumber longs by more than two to one, 473,865 to 208,422. The number of short positions rose by 6,179 contracts last week, and longs rose by 4,336 contracts. Positions among swaps dealers show 244,099 short contracts versus 216,190 long positions. Swaps dealers dumped 340 contracts from their short positions last week and added 13,188 contracts from their long positions.

Among the states, New Mexico added four rigs last week and Louisiana added three. Colorado, Pennsylvania and Texas added one rig each, and Alaska, North Dakota, Utah and West Virginia each lost one rig.

In the Permian Basin of west Texas and southeastern New Mexico, the rig count rose by two to 160. The Eagle Ford Basin in south Texas remained unchanged at 33, and the Williston Basin (Bakken) in North Dakota and Montana now has 27 working rigs, a decrease of one compared with the prior week.

Enterprise Products Partners L.P. (NYSE: EPD) lists a posted price of $42.40 per barrel for WTI and a July 16 price of $43.35 a barrel for Eagle Ford crude. The price for both varieties rose by $0.54 a barrel over the past week.

The pump price of gasoline fell by about 1.3% week over week. Saturday morning’s average price in the United States was $2.215 a gallon, down from $2.244 a week ago. The year-ago price was $2.772 a gallon.

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