Energy

Oil Rig Count Jumped by 9 Last Week, Hedge Funds Can't Decide Direction

Paul Ausick

Published: June 4, 2016 9:40 am

Last Updated: January 13, 2020 7:12 am

In the week ended June 3, the number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States totaled 325, up nine from the prior week and compared with a total of 642 a year ago. Including 82 other rigs drilling for natural gas, there are a total of 408 working rigs in the country, up by four week over week and down 460 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 about 0.6% on Friday to settle at $48.90, down about 1.3% for the week. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported last Wednesday that crude supplies had decreased by 1.4 million barrels in the week ended May 27 and that gasoline supplies had fallen by 1.5 million barrels.

The addition of nine oil rigs over the past week marks the highest level of new rigs since November of 2015. At the same time, the number of rigs drilling for natural gas fell by five, leaving the gas rig count down by 140 year over year.

Fewer natural gas rigs means less production, and less production means less gas going into storage, which means higher prices. Natural gas touched a high of $2.45 on Friday, its highest price this year. Last week’s natural gas injection into storage totaled 82 billion cubic feet, well below the five-year average of 98 billion cubic feet and even further below last year’s injection for the same period of 126 billion cubic feet.

The amount of natural gas already in storage is 35% above the five-year average, down a couple of percentage points from the prior week. Now that warmer weather is on its way, demand for air-conditioning will rise, and if producers can restrain themselves from overproducing, prices should continue to increase.

The number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States is down by 317 year over year and up by nine week over week. The natural gas rig count fell by five rigs to 82. The count for natural gas rigs is down by 140 year over year. Natural gas for July delivery closed the week at $2.40 per million BTUs, more than 10% 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 89.8% of capacity, a week-over-week decrease of about 73,000 barrels a day. Imports rose by about 524,000 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 (CFTC) weekly Commitments of Traders report — dropped 7,303 short contracts last week and also dumped 7,373 long contracts. The movement reflects changes as of the May 31 settlement date. Managed money holds 273,948 long positions compared with 63,302 short positions. Open interest totaled 1,709,540. There were 39 hedge funds with large short positions last week, down by five compared with the prior week. Although longs outnumber shorts by more than four to one, hedge funds continue to look elsewhere for profits.

Among the producers themselves, short positions outnumber longs by more than three to two: 472,201 to 182,723. The number of short positions rose by 20,617 contracts last week and longs rose by 18,489 positions. Positions among swaps dealers show 252,194 short contracts versus 202,310 long positions. Swaps dealers dropped 6,861 contracts from their short positions last week and dropped 2,353 long positions.

Among the states, Texas added three rigs and Alaska and New Mexico added two each. Oklahoma and Pennsylvania each lost two rigs and Louisiana dropped one rig.

In the Permian Basin of west Texas and southeastern New Mexico, the rig count rose by five to 142. The Eagle Ford Basin in south Texas remained unchanged at 29, and the Williston Basin (Bakken) in North Dakota and Montana now has 22 working rigs, also unchanged compared with the prior week.

Enterprise Products Partners L.P. (NYSE: EPD) lists a posted price of $45.07 per barrel for WTI and a June 4 price of $46.02 a barrel for Eagle Ford crude. The price for both varieties fell by $0.20 a barrel over the past week. Crude has gained about $4.00 a barrel in the past four weeks. Enterprise has not posted a price for North Dakota Light Sweet for the past seven weeks.

The pump price of gasoline rose by about 1.4% week over week. Saturday morning’s average price in the United States was $2.354 a gallon, up from $2.322 a week ago. The year-ago price was $2.759 a gallon.