Energy Intelligence Briefing articles from May 2005

Energy Intelligence Briefing archives from May 2005

US downward revisions cloud global demand growth.
May 4, 2005... NEW YORK -- Preliminary data suggests that the growth of global oil consumption is still humming along, logging an increase of 2.4% in April compared to a year earlier, after a 2% gain in the first quarter. But cracks are beginning to appear in...

Additional Saudi oil output will come at higher price.
May 5, 2005... NEW YORK -- Ignoring a well supplied crude oil market, Saudi Arabia on Wednesday tightened price differentials for most June exports, effectively raising its official selling price for shipments to Europe and the US, while cutting prices to...

Iraq schedules ambitious Southern crude oil exports.
May 16, 2005... NEW YORK -- Crews were still repairing two sections of Iraq's northern crude export pipeline on Monday that was bombed out of service by insurgents last week, and it was unclear when the pipeline would start flowing again. The Kirkuk pipeline...

Opec prepares to ease up as global oil stocks swell.
May 17, 2005... NEW YORK -- Oil stocks in industrialized nations rose in April by 1.2 million barrels per day, all of it in the US, and are likely to grow rapidly in the rest of the second quarter as demand growth is slowing and Opec producers, at least for...

Push, no trans-Atlantic pull for North Sea loadings.
May 20, 2005... LONDON -- North Sea crudes face a sodden Atlantic Basin as operators try to push even reduced volumes into an oversupplied US Gulf market. It does not help that Brent-related West African crudes are also receiving a somewhat cold shoulder from...

Exxon Mobil, Lee Raymond stay true to their roots.
May 25, 2005... DALLAS -- When Exxon Mobil Chairman and Chief Executive Lee R. Raymond calls the company's annual shareholder meeting to order this morning, he will face an audience of mostly contented shareholders, along with a dozen dissidents representing...

US keen, Asia on the fence for West African crude.
May 27, 2005... LONDON -- Having cleared all but a handful of cargoes loading in June, sellers of West African crude are now focusing on July, although only a few July spot and term cargoes have changed hands so far as most loading programs have yet to be...

Stagnating output, tax hike crimping Russian exports.
May 31, 2005... MOSCOW -- Russia's stagnating crude production and a massive tax hike are taking their toll on the country's exports, as Moscow pencils in a June port loading programs implying a 129,000 barrel per day drop from May. Planned seaborne crude...

Khodorkovsky and Yukos continue fight after verdict.
May 31, 2005... MOSCOW -- Mikhail Khodorkovsky, main shareholder of oil major Yukos and once Russia's richest man, has been sentenced to nine years in prison for tax evasion and fraud. The punishment, coming after 12 days of arduous verdict reading by Moscow...