Total Share Discussion Threads

[the grumpy old men] 28/3/2016 17:21

Barclays warns of a "rush for the exits" on commodities

Commodities
Commodities have had the strongest start to a year since 2011
Sponsored by HSBC
list of article image 2
For these girls rugby is Brazil's true 'joga bonito'
The favela fliers plan to capture the hearts and inspire minds of young sports fans across the globe

Rhiannon Bury

28 March 2016 • 4:22pm

Analysts at Barclays have warned of a “rush for the exits” as investors back away from commodities, resulting in price levels for oil and copper dropping as much as 25pc.

A note issued by the bank said that although investors have been attracted to commodities as one of the best performing assets so far in 2016, returns are unlikely to be sustained in the second quarter of the year.

“This could make commodities vulnerable to a wave of investor liquidation that we estimate could, in a worst case scenario, knock as much as 20-25% from current price levels,” the note said.

This would take the price of oil back to the low $30s and copper to the low $4,000s, the analysts said.

The bank said that the recent price appreciation does not seem to be well founded in improving fundamentals, and that key markets such as oil and copper already face overhangs of excess production capacity and inventories.

Net flows of investment into commodities totalled more than $20bn in January and February, the strongest start to a year since 2011.

But futures positioning in copper and oil markets has switched from bearish to bullish extremes in a matter of weeks, and there is also evidence of a surge in investment flows into Chinese commodity markets.

Barclays said a short-term turning point for investors slow might be close, which could result in investors liquidating assets quickly, and at the same time, hitting prices.

“We very much doubt that recent large inflows to commodity investments are the start of new wave of enthusiasm for long-term, broad-based exposure. Given the weakness of underlying fundamentals, we suspect that the latest move into commodities by investors may be closer to its end than its beginning,” it said.

[the grumpy old men] 25/3/2016 22:24

Lindsey Janies/Bloomberg

The liquefied natural gas tanker Asia Vision left Cheniere Energy's Sabine Pass export terminal in Louisiana on Wednesday with the first cargo of U.S. shale gas.
By DANIEL GROSS
Published: 25 March 2016 05:06 PM
Updated: 25 March 2016 05:06 PM

The story of the history of the United States is one of innovations and infrastructure working in tandem to forge new trade channels and routes. Some were abhorrent, like the triangle trade, which involved slaves and agricultural materials. The Erie Canal linked the farms of the Midwestern U.S. with the consumers of the Eastern Seaboard and Europe. The invention of electronics and personal computers created heavily traveled trade routes linking factories in Asia to ports on the West Coast of the United States. And now it’s fracking’s turn.

Fracking has fundamentally altered America’s economic trajectory by liberating vast resources of both oil and natural gas from the ground beneath our feet. And until very recently, these supplies were essentially stranded. The U.S. has a reasonably good system for moving crude oil around the U.S. — pipelines, and trains in a pinch. But laws prohibited the oil from being exported. (The ban was lifted last year.) Supplies of natural gas were even more constricted. To export oil, you simply pump crude onto one of the thousands of tankers that ply the seas, which can unload them with relative ease at thousands of points around the world. Moving natural gas around the globe is much more complicated. You need very expensive, highly specialized equipment to process it into a liquid form so that it can be shipped; highly specialized ships that can carry the cargo; and, finally, dedicated terminals that can unload and process the gas.

Until this year, the U.S. had no functioning capacity to export liquefied natural gas.

Which is too bad. Precisely because it doesn’t easily move around the world, the price of natural gas varies widely across the globe. In Japan, the spot price of natural gas is $8.25 per million Btus, compared with about $2 per million Btus in the U.S. That means beleaguered U.S. natural gas producers have a huge opportunity to get a higher price for the product and a willingness to absorb a chunk of the infrastructure cost.

And natural gas can be a powerful force of American soft power. Europe has a significant problem. It would like to use less coal, and more natural gas, to produce heat and electricity. But a lot of Europe’s natural gas comes from Russia. The Baltic states, Hungary, the Czech Republic, and Bulgaria each get more than two-thirds of their gas from Russia while Germany, Italy, Austria, and Poland each get more than one-third from there. Worse, Russia has proved willing, over and over again, to use natural gas as a weapon of power and intimidation, especially against former satellite states. If the U.S. could figure out a way to ship lots of natural gas to Eastern Europe, it would be a move evoking the Berlin airlift — bringing both hope and needed supplies.

Good news, then: In the past month, natural gas exports have started in earnest. Several years ago, Cheniere Energy began building a massive project on the Louisiana coast from which it could export natural gas. And on Feb. 24, the company announced that port’s first cargo had been loaded on to an LNG carrier called Asia Vision, bound for Brazil. Asia Vision arrived in Rio de Janeiro last week.

This week, fracking opened a new trade route. As The Wall Street Journal reported, Range Resources and Consol Energy, two companies active in the Marcellus Shale formation, have struck a deal with Ineos, a U.K.-based company. The American firms drilled for natural gas in Western Pennsylvania, distilled it into 27,500 cubic meters of liquid ethane, and then loaded it onto a ship at the Marcus Hook terminal near Philadelphia on March 9. On Wednesday, it arrived in Norway, where it will be used at a refinery. Ineos has set up what it calls a “virtual pipeline across the Atlantic,” a group of ships that will cross the northern Atlantic carrying ethane from the New World to the Old World.

Now, these shipments are mere drops in the bucket of global demand. A couple of big boats filled with liquefied versions of natural gas won’t change the balance of power in Europe, or signify a powerful new source of American influence, or reflate the depressed price of U.S.-produced natural gas. But they could be the start of something. Ineos told The Wall Street Journal that within four years it envisions filling eight monthly shipments from the U.S. Several other LNG export terminals are under construction in the U.S. It’s not too difficult to imagine that within a decade there could be a host of virtual pipelines connecting the U.S. to distant points south, east, and west. Every major trade route opens with a maiden voyage.

Daniel Gross is the author of “Better, Stronger, Faster: The Myth of American Decline … and the Rise of a New Economy.” Twitter: @grossdm

[waldron] 24/3/2016 18:16

News ID:138632
Publish Date: Thu, 24 Mar 2016 22:31:18 GMT
Service: Iran
Iran, France’s Total sign confidential oil deal: Zangeneh
Iran, France’s Total sign confidential oil deal: Zangeneh
Tehran and France’s oil giant Total have signed a non-disclosure agreement on the development of the South Azadegan oil field shared by Iran and Iraq.

On Thursday, Iranian Minister of Petroleum Bijan Zangeneh said Tehran and Total have agreed to keep the articles of the accord confidential, adding that the French firm is now “studying its participation in the [development of] the oil field,” which is one of the largest in Iran.

Zangeneh had announced earlier this month that Iran and Total were in talks on the development of the South Azadegan oil field, which is said to hold an in-place oil reserve of about 33.2 billion barrels. He added that a confidential agreement was due between the two sides on the project.

In January, Mahmoud Mar’ashi, the project manager of South Azadegan at Iran’s Petroleum Engineering and Development Company (PEDEC), said the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) had discussed the South Azadegan project with Total as well as other European and Asian contractors.

Iran discovered Azadegan oil field in 1999 in what was the country’s biggest oil find in decades.

The country accordingly teamed up with Japan’s Inpex to push the project toward development. However, the Japanese company quit the project as a result of US sanctions against Iran.

The NIOC later divided the project into South Azadegan and North Azadegan. The northern section of the oil field has been awarded to China’s CNPC.

Iran is now seeking foreign investment in the development of South Azadegan after the removal of anti-Tehran sanctions as part of last July’s nuclear deal with the P5+1 – Russia, China, France, Britain, the US and Germany.

The country has five joint fields with Iraq, which include North Azadegan, South Azadegan, North Yaran, South Yaran and Yadavaran.

[waldron] 23/3/2016 22:44

March 24, 2016 5:00 am JST
France's Total to make Japanese renewables debut with megasolar farm

A mega-solar plant on Ise Foods' farmland.

TOKYO -- French oil and gas producer Total will step into Japan's renewable energy market with a large-scale solar power plant set to begin production in 2017.

The 26,000kW megasolar plant in Ishikawa Prefecture will use panels from U.S. subsidiary SunPower, acquired in 2011, that convert sunlight to electricity with 20% efficiency -- the highest available. Ise Foods, Japan's largest egg producer, will house the plant on the site of a former chicken farm.

Total, SunPower and Ise Foods will operate the plant jointly. Each will put up part of the project's roughly 10 billion yen ($88.8 million) cost. A consortium led by Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp. will provide additional funding through a project finance scheme.

The solar farm is seen producing 29 million kilowatt-hours in its first year, enough to supply around 8,900 households. That power will be sold to regional utility Hokuriku Electric Power for 36 yen per kwh, the government-set purchase price for solar power in fiscal 2013. Though lower than that level now, Japan's purchase prices remain high compared with those in Europe and the U.S., making the country an appealing energy investment target.

Ise Foods is working to put more solar plants on its vacant land. Total is looking into teaming with the egg producer on other megasolar projects going forward, as well as with other companies that have land to spare.

Total intends to invest $500 million in renewable energy projects annually in light of stagnant low prices on its mainstay petroleum products. The company runs megasolar plants in Chile and South Africa. Japan will be its first Asian outpost.

Companies including telecommunications giant SoftBank Group, financial services provider Orix and trading house Marubeni are already building and running megasolar plants in Japan. Total looks to secure higher earnings with SunPower's panels.

Total also aims to bring to Japan its commercial jet fuel made from biomass.

(Nikkei)

[sarkasm] 22/3/2016 18:33

Total Petrochemical Reports Emissions, Unit Upsets at Texas Refinery
22/03/2016 12:04pm
Dow Jones News

Total (EU:FP)
Intraday Stock Chart

Today : Tuesday 22 March 2016
Click Here for more Total Charts.

By Dan Molinski



Total Petrochemical & Refining USA reported gas emissions at its Port Arthur, Texas, refinery following an unforeseen rush of acid gas.

"A sudden surge of acid gas overwhelmed the header and caused an upset at Units 870 and 875," the unit of Total SA (TOT) said in a filing with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. "Units 865 and 866 were slumped (reduced) to allow the acid gas from the surge to be processed at Units 870 and 875."

The company said the units didn't shut down during the incident, but that it lead to above-normal emissions Monday of sulfur dioxide.

The 225,000-barrel-a-day refinery is located about 100 miles east of Houston.



Write to Dan Molinski at [e-mail]



(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 22, 2016 07:49 ET (11:49 GMT)

[waldron] 22/3/2016 07:53

European oil major Total and China’s state-owned oil company CNPC said Monday they signed a new strategic cooperation agreement on Sunday, during the China Development Forum in Beijing, Kallanish Energy learns.

Total CEO, Patrick Pouyanné, and CNPC chairman, Wang Yilin, agreed to extend the companies’ existing collaboration through development of new joint projects, promoting oil and gas cooperation on a global scale for “win-win outcomes.”

“Under the agreement, CNPC and Total will join hands in oil and gas investment, technological R&D and oilfield services,” CNPC said, in a statement, without providing further details.

The companies’ 10-plus-year partnership includes major projects such as the Sulige gas field in Inner Mongolia, China, Halfaya in Iraq, Yamal LNG in Russia, Kashagan in Kazakhstan and Libra in Brazil.

The joint projects go beyond upstream and downstream businesses, with trade of crude and petroleum products both in China and abroad also included.

[grupo] 18/3/2016 21:32

Fri Mar 18, 2016 4:43pm EDT
Total says marketing head to quit, eyes solar power
PARIS

Total said on Friday executive committee member and new energies head Philippe Boisseau, who led the oil major into solar power, would quit next month and confirmed a newspaper report it aims to produce solar energy within two decades.

Boisseau, also head of marketing and services, will be replaced from April 15 by Momar Nguer, 59, senior vice president for Africa and Middle East marketing and services, Total said on Friday.

Philippe Sauquet, president for refining and chemicals and a member of the executive committee, was named interim president for new energies.

Chief Executive Patrick Pouyanne said in a statement Boisseau had "contributed significantly to the company's growth" and was "the man who steered Total into solar energy".

Total has invested some $3 billion in solar, which accounts for 3 percent of the group's assets. Total entered the solar business with the $1.3 billion 2011 takeover of U.S. solar panel maker SunPower Corp in one of the biggest moves by an oil and gas major into renewable energy.

Total aims to produce electricity within 20 years as part of its development in renewable energy, especially solar, a group spokesman said, citing a presentation by Pouyanne given on Wednesday and confirming a report in daily newspaper Les Echos.

"The question was raised as to what to do in the next 20 years to commercialize, produce and stock solar more than today," the spokesman said.

Les Echos said Pouyanne wants renewable energy to account for 20 percent of the company's portfolio by 2035.

Total Energie Gaz announced in September that it planned to sell electricity to small and medium-sized business customers in France from the start of this year.

(Reporting by Cyril Altmeyer and James Regan; Editing by Mark Potter)

[ariane] 17/3/2016 10:35

MOSCOW, March 17./TASS/. Fundamental factors for the construction of the Nord Stream-2 pipeline are good, Douglas Buckley, vice president of Shell said on the sidelines of the LNG 2016 Congress.

Read also
Application of EU energy market rules to Nord Stream 2 sparks controversy — media
Russia watching process of forming EC position on Nord Stream-2 — diplomat
Russia may supply gas through Ukraine even after Nord Stream 2 is commissioned — minister
Austria's OMV estimates total investment in Nord Stream-2 construction at €10 bln

"We are commercial company and we look for commercial opportunity. The fundamentals are good for projects such as Nord Stream expansion," he said.

Buckley added that the best variant for Europe is to have as many gas suppliers as possible.

Nord Stream 2 implies construction of 2 lines of the pipeline with the total capacity of 55 bln cubic meters from Russia to Germany across the Baltic Sea. The route and the entry point to the German gas transport system in Greifswald are intended to be the same as for the first Nord Stream gas pipeline launched in 2011. The project will be implemented by the New European Pipeline AG. In this company, Gazprom will hold 51% while German E.ON and BASF/Wintershall, British-Dutch Shell, Austrian OMV will hold 10% each, France’s ENGIE will own 9%.


More:

[ariane] 17/3/2016 10:32

Total Turns Away from French Shale Permit

The Montelimar permit may have been re-awarded to Total following a legal battle, reviving a debate about shale gas that had once been considered closed. However the French company has said it will not conduct shale operations in the 4,327 km2 area that covers five departments in the southeast of France.

“As oil prices average $30 per barrel, I have other things to do than exploring shale gas resources in places where we are not welcomed”, said Patrick Pouyanne, Total CEO, before a group of companies from the Languedoc-Roussillon-Midi-Pyrénées region on March 11 in the nearby city of Montpellier.

Brent crude may have firmed to about $40/b since, but this doesn't undermine Total's economic argument that shale gas exploration in France is not a priority for it. Moreover the CEO's remarks represent a big win for the environmental activists shortly after a successful anti-fracking rally which drew between 7,000 and 15,000 people to the small town of Barjac on February 28. The protest was organised a month after the administrative court of Cergy-Pontoise ruled in favour of Total.

The oil company may have the law on its side but has no intention of developing its exploration activities in an unfavourable political environment.

“Total conducts shale gas operations in other countries including Argentina. As for France, I will not go against the political will. In fact, I am not convinced that there are actually shale gas resources in this area”, added Pouyanne.

His remarks echo what the new CEO of Total said during a national radio interview on Europe 1 back in January: “I have no desire to force through on this issue nor to slip in through the back door. If the national community does not support shale gas explorations, we will not do it. I am ready to seek a consensus which is needed on this very issue”.

Environment minister Segolene Royal on March 2 reaffirmed her commitment to France's fracking ban which was imposed in 2011, adding that the ban will be incorporated into a Mining Code Reform bill to be presented in June.

Kevin Bonnaud



Natural Gas Europe welcomes all viewpoints. Should you wish to provide an alternative perspective on the above article, please contact [e-mail]

[grupo guitarlumber] 15/3/2016 21:04

BUSINESS 19:02
ELPE will have to buy first loads of Iran oil from Total
CHRYSSA LIAGGOU

TAGS: Energy

Hellenic Petroleum (ELPE) will not be able to purchase its first delivery of Iranian crude oil directly from Tehran, as had been foreseen when the Greek refiner signed its deal with the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) earlier this year. Rather, this month’s load, and likely the next three, scheduled for April, will have to be purchased from France’s Total.

The uncertainty in the regulations regarding the lifting of sanctions on Iran has led to problems when it comes to carrying out international transactions with the country. As a result, Athens-listed ELPE is currently unable to be supplied directly with Iranian oil quantities as provided by its deal signed with NIOC on January 22.

The same factor is causing problems with ELPE’s payment of the first 100-million-euro installment of its 600-million-euro debt to the Iranian company. “We have disbursed the installment, but it has not yet reached Tehran,” an ELPE source told Kathimerini, highlighting the difficulties in transactions involving Iran and international credit institutions.

Given its size, Total enjoys different treatment when it comes to carrying out international transactions, even when these involve Iran. Total has signed an agreement for the acquisition of major quantities of Iranian crude.

[grupo guitarlumber] 15/3/2016 20:25

Market Movers

• Eni (NYSE: E) finally began producing from its Goliat platform in the Arctic, the northernmost platform in the world. The offshore oil field, the first producing field in the Barents Sea, suffered from repeated delays and cost overruns. The $6 billion project will eventually produce 100,000 barrels per day.

• The government of Tanzania said that Total SA (NYSE: TOT) has the funds to build a major oil pipeline from Uganda to a port on the Tanzanian coast, and construction should begin as quickly as possible. The $4 billion pipeline could connect Uganda’s oil fields to the global market, opening up a regional hub for East African oil exports that could benefit multiple companies prospecting in the area. Despite the government’s statement, Total declined to comment.

• Linn Energy (NASDAQ: LINE) said in its Q4 results that it “does not expect to remain in compliance with all of the restrictive covenants contained in its credit facilities throughout 2016.” That “raises substantial doubt about the Company’s ability to continue as a going concern.” Linn Energy’s share price traded down by almost 20 percent in early trading on March 15.

Tuesday March 15, 2016

Oil prices lost some of their shine over the past week, as reality set in. Oil markets remain oversupplied, inventories are still rising, and hopes have faded surrounding OPEC’s ability to negotiate some kind of production cut. Iran punctured bullish sentiment when it said that it would not accept the OPEC-Russia production freeze deal until it had returned output to pre-sanctions level, which means that it has no intention of choking off output until it ramps up production by an additional 1 million barrels per day.

Rally is too early. Even leaving aside Iran and the record high levels of oil sitting in storage, there could be a ceiling to the oil price rally due to the responsiveness of U.S. shale. A rally above $40 or $50 would bring U.S. shale production back online, due to the short lead times between new drilling and production. That would send prices back down. The key to a sustained rally is a more substantial cut back in production, which can only be possible if drillers are starved of capital, Goldman Sachs concluded recently. “An early rally in prices before a deficit materializes would prove self-defeating,̶1; Jeffrey Currie, head of commodities research at Goldman Sachs, wrote in a March 11 report.

A reaction from the shale industry could take longer than expected, others argue. With battered balance sheets, thousands of laid off workers, idled equipment, and depleted access to capital, it is not as if oil drillers can spring into action immediately. For example, North Dakota’s Director of Mineral Resources, Lynn Helms, thinks it could take oil prices rising above $60 per barrel before drilling picks up. “If you’ve been on a strict diet for a long period of time, it takes a while to put the weight back on,” Helms told reporters last week. As a result, even if oil prices rise, it will take time for damaged drillers to repair their balance sheets.

“Light at the end of the tunnel” for oil prices. The IEA, for its part, weighed in last week with a cautiously optimistic take. The Paris-based energy agency said in its latest Oil Market Report that oil prices may have reached a bottom. Supply disruptions from Iraq to Nigeria, coupled with falling U.S. production and a weaker U.S. dollar are all working together to push oil prices up from their lows. That could mean that oil prices have “bottomed out.”

The IEA revised its estimate for supply cuts, expecting a deeper contraction than it did in last month’s report: increasing its estimated cuts from non-OPEC producers from 600,000 barrels per day to 750,000 barrels per day. Iran’s expected ramp up in production has also been less impressive than expected. The oil markets will remain oversupplied through much of this year, but the supply and demand will converge much more rapidly in the second half of 2016. There is a lot of uncertainty, to be sure, but the IEA said that there is “light at the end of the tunnel.”

Obama admin cuts off Atlantic drilling. There was growing speculation that the Obama administration would take initial steps to open up the Atlantic seaboard to oil and gas drilling as part of the Interior Department’s latest five-year plan. Instead, the administration surprised the industry by removing the suspected lease sale for the Atlantic Ocean in its 2017 to 2022 proposed plan, released on March 15. The oil and gas industry have expressed strong interest in exploring the Atlantic outer continental shelf, which could hold 3.5 billion barrels of oil and 30 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. But the latest development may not be all that significant, given the fact that a new administration next year can reverse course. No drilling had been expected before the end of the decade anyways. Low oil prices would also mean that any E&P companies would probably proceed slowly with high-cost exploration. For now, though, the region remains off limits.

Apache and Shell drill in Egypt. Apache Corp. (NYSE: APA) and Royal Dutch Shell (NYSE: RDS.A) are set to start drilling Egypt’s first unconventional gas well by the end of March, with production slated for June. The projected will be located in Egypt’s Western Desert and will be a milestone for Egypt, a country that is in desperate need of natural gas. The project comes as Eni is also developing a massive offshore deposit of natural gas.

Electricity sales down in the U.S. In a new report, the EIA found that electricity sales in the U.S. declined on an absolute basis in 2015, down by 1.1 percent from the previous year. Steadily increasing energy efficiency, particularly from appliances, combined with slow economic growth have cut into electricity consumption. It was also the fifth time in eight years that electricity sales declined. As efficiency continues to improve, the growth prospects for utility companies are highly questionable.

U.S. West Coast LNG export terminal rejected. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission rejected a permit for an LNG export terminal in Oregon late last week. The Jordon Cove LNG export terminal has been seeking permits for years, but FERC said the developers failed to demonstrate how the benefits from a pipeline that would feed the terminal would outweigh the adverse effects on landowners. The more than $5 billion project was one of the leading candidates to export natural gas from North America’s west coast.

Russia announces withdrawal from Syria. In a surprise move, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the withdrawal of troops from Syria on March 14, after declaring victory. Putin had propped up his ally, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, fighting off an array of opposition groups. UN-led negotiations are seeking an end to the multiyear war, and while any solution remains extremely difficult, there are glimmers of hope that a political settlement can be reached by all parties involved.

We invite you to read several of the most recent articles we have published which may be of interest to you:

IEA Sees “Light At The End Of The Tunnel” For Oil Markets
Solar Power Is About To Get MUCH Cheaper
Why Oil Prices May Not Move Higher
U.S. and Canada Crack Down On Methane From Oil And Gas
How To Successfully Invest In Energy Stocks
How Lenders Control The Future Of Oilfield Services
$67 Oil Has All The Majors Converging Here
Choking And Lifting Preventing The Decline In U.S. Shale?
Oil Price Crash Was Not Saudi Arabia’s Fault
An Energy Pair Trade To Take Advantage Of Current Turmoil

That’s all from your midweek intelligence report, we hope you enjoyed it and we´ll be back on Friday, with your latest energy market update, industry intelligence and special report.

Best regards,

Evan Kelly
News Editor, Oilprice.com