In an oil and gas report sent to Rigzone on Tuesday by the Macquarie team, Macquarie strategists, including Walt Chancellor, revealed that they are forecasting that U.S. crude inventories will be down by 3.5 million barrels for the week ending January 2.
“This follows a 1.9 million barrel draw in the prior week, with the crude balance realizing tight relative to our expectations alongside oddly low import levels, particularly from Canada,” the strategists said in the report.
“Given last week’s figures and year-end effects, we see potential for volatility in this week’s EIA [U.S. Energy Information Administration] oil balance,” they added.
“For the week ending 1/2, from refineries, we look for a minimal increase in crude runs. Among net imports, we model a moderate nominal increase, with exports (+0.8 million barrels per day) and imports (+1.2 million barrels per day following last week’s soft print) sharply higher on a nominal basis,” they continued.
The strategists warned in the report that the timing of cargoes remains a source of potential volatility in the weekly crude balance.
“From implied domestic supply (prod.+adj.+transfers), we look for a healthy reduction (-0.6 million barrels per day) following a strong print last week,” they said.
“Rounding out the picture, we anticipate another small build (+0.3 million barrels) in SPR [Strategic Petroleum Reserve] stocks for the week ending Jan. 2,” they added.
The Macquarie strategists went on to note that, “among products”, they “again look for very heavy builds, led by gasoline (+8.1 million barrels) and distillate (+4.5 million barrels), with jet stocks slightly higher (+0.3 million barrels)”.
“Amidst holiday effects, we model implied demand for these three products at ~13.0 million barrels per day for the week ending January 2,” they added.
In its latest weekly petroleum status report at the time of writing, which was released on December 31 and included data for the week ending December 26, the EIA highlighted that U.S. commercial crude oil inventories, excluding those in the SPR, decreased by 1.9 million barrels from the week ending December 19 to the week ending December 26.
That report showed that crude oil stocks, not including the SPR, stood at 422.9 million barrels on December 26, 424.8 million barrels on December 19, and 415.6 million barrels on December 27, 2024. Crude oil in the SPR stood at 413.2 million barrels on December 26, 413.0 million barrels on December 19, and 393.6 million barrels on December 27, 2024, the report highlighted.
Total petroleum stocks – including crude oil, total motor gasoline, fuel ethanol, kerosene type jet fuel, distillate fuel oil, residual fuel oil, propane/propylene, and other oils – stood at 1.699 billion barrels on December 26, the report revealed. Total petroleum stocks were up 10.4 million barrels week on week and up 75.6 million barrels year on year, the report pointed out.
In an oil and gas report sent to Rigzone by the Macquarie team on December 30, Macquarie strategists, including Walt Chancellor, revealed that they were forecasting that U.S. crude inventories would be up by 2.1 million barrels for the week ending December 26.
The EIA’s next weekly petroleum status report is scheduled to be released later today. It will include data for the week ending January 2.
The EIA report states that it “provides timely information on supply and selected prices of crude oil and principal petroleum products”. In the report, the EIA describes itself as the independent statistical and analytical agency within the U.S. Department of Energy.
On its website, Macquarie describes itself as “a global financial services group operating in asset management, retail and business banking, wealth management, as well as advisory, and risk and capital solutions across debt, equity, financial markets and commodities”.
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