交易员们在油价反弹上押下重注

据今日油价4月28日，路透社John Kemp周一表示，全球石油储备空间不足，产量下降速度不够快，但上周对冲基金购买的WTI合约数量创下纪录。上周的原油期货购买量为1.22亿桶，至少是去年12月以来的最高水平。Kemp表示，市场对油价反弹的预期促使购买量增加。尽管没有迹象表明这种迹象一定会出现，但买家必须要做好这种反弹很快发生的准备。相反，最新的价格走势表明情况恰恰相反。周一，西德克萨斯中质原油价格下跌了25%，至每桶13美元以下，周二在亚洲交易中继续下跌，跌破每桶11美元。

美国石油基金昨日表示，将在4天内出售所有6月份交割的石油期货。这与西德克萨斯中质油价格下跌有很大关系，也与人们对石油储能不足日益增长的担忧有很大关系——这种担忧上周并没有困扰到对冲基金和其他做市商。然而，本周他们可能会改变想法。

高盛(Goldman Sachs)昨日成为最新一家加入日益增多的石油储备末日预言者行列的公司。这家投资银行表示，全球的存储能力可能在短短三周内达到极限。该行分析师在一份报告中表示，这将加剧市场的波动性，并使波动性保持在高位，直到供需重新平衡。要想达到市场供需平衡，高盛预计下个月石油日产量需再减少1800万桶。

根据国际能源署(IEA) 4月份的估计，新增的每日1800万桶石油需求是在总需求减少2900万桶的基础上增加的。

除了欧佩克下个月将开始的970万桶/天的减产外，美国石油日产量还减少了约60万桶/天，加拿大已将石油日产量削减了30万桶。据路透社报道，巴西已将日产量削减了20万桶。尽管未来几周美国减产速度可能加快，但可能为时已晚。

据《华尔街日报》报道，大宗商品分析公司Kayrros的数据显示，全球石油日产量为1000万桶。该公司的首席分析师安托万·哈尔夫(Antoine Halff)称这个速度是可怕的，并警告说，如果这个速度继续保持下去，三个多月后存储就会达到极限。

Kayrro产品经理奥古斯汀?普拉特表示，对石油行业来说，幸运的是，石油行业的新增产量已经有所下降。

美国石油储存空间几乎已经将要耗尽，所以任何需求的改善都是值得庆祝的。库欣是美国最大的石油储备基地，上周库存增加了10%，达到5970万桶。这仅比峰值低了2500万桶，听起来可能很多。但如果增加的速度继续保持下去，情况就不一样了。

企业产品合作伙伴公司（Enterprise Products Partners）本月早些时候在其向北的海运管道中为生产商提供了产能，使那些难以将石油存放在墨西哥湾附近的美国石油生产商能够将石油运往库欣的存储中心。

对于生产者和看涨的对冲基金来说，最主要的问题在于没有一个快速的方法来解决储存问题。关闭油井需要时间，甚至将油井废弃也需要时间。据报道，一些俄罗斯生产商正在考虑将油井废弃作为快速减产的一种方式。

这是许多小型石油生产商的破产正在发生，这也意味着产量将持续下降，这对多头来说是个好消息。问题是这种下降是否会很快发生，就目前而言，这是极不可能的，因此当下一个近月石油合约即将到期时，我们可能会看到另一轮大规模抛售。

洪伟立 摘译自 今日油价

原文如下：

Traders Are Betting Big On An Oil Price Rebound

Global oil storage space is running low, production is not falling quickly enough, and yet last week hedge funds bought a record amount of WTI contracts, Reuters’ John Kemp said Monday. At the equivalent of 122 million barrels, the amount of crude futures purchased last week was the highest since at least last December. According to Kemp, the reason for the increased buying is an expectation of an oil price rebound. The buyers must expect this rebound to take place soon, even though there are no indications to support such an attitude. On the contrary, the latest price moves suggest the opposite. On Monday, West Texas Intermediate dropped by 25 percent to less than $13 a barrel and continued falling on Tuesday in Asian trading, sinking below $11 a barrel.

The United States Oil Fund said yesterday that it would sell all its oil futures for June delivery within four days. That had a lot to do with the drop in WTI prices, and it also had a lot to do with the growing worry about storage space – a worry that did not bother hedge funds and other market-making buyers last week. It may change their mind this week, however.

Goldman Sachs yesterday became the latest to join the rising number of oil storage doomsayers. The investment bank said that the world’s storage capacity could reach its limit within just three weeks. This, the bank’s analysts said in a note, would heighten volatility and keep it high until supply and demand rebalances. For this to happen, supply needs to decline by another 18 million bpd next month, as this is the size of demand loss that Goldman expects.

That is much easier said than done, because those additional 18 million barrels per day comes on the heels of a demand loss totaling 29 million bpd, according to International Energy Agency estimates for April.

In addition to the 9.7 million bpd in OPEC+ cuts that should begin next month, U.S. production has fallen by some 600,000 bpd and counting, and Canada has slashed its oil production by 300,000 bpd. Brazil has cut 200,000 bpd off its daily average, Reuters reports.

This is barely above 1 million bpd in production cuts outside OPEC+. While the chances are that U.S. production cuts will likely accelerate in the coming weeks as companies rush to shut in the wells that produce oil at rates higher than the selling price, it may be too little too late.

Global oil storage is filling at a rate of 10 million bpd, according to data from commodities analysis firm Kayrros, reported by the Wall Street Journal. The firm’s chief analyst Antoine Halff called this rate monstrous and warned that if it continues unabated, storage would be full in a little over three months.

Luckily for the industry, the rate of additions has slowed down a bit, Kayrros product manager Augustin Prate told Oilprice.

“Crude demand in China has almost fully recovered, with refinery runs back to pre-lockdown levels,” Prate said.

The United States is among the places where storage space is already tight, so any improvement in demand would be a cause for celebration. Cushing, the country’s largest oil storage complex, added 10 percent last week, to 59.7 million barrels. This is 25 million barrels below maximum capacity, which may sound like a lot. It isn’t if the rate of addition continues.

Enterprise Products Partners earlier this month offered producers space in its northbound Seaway pipeline, providing U.S. oil producers struggling to place their oil near the Gulf Coast the ability to ship their barrels to the storage hub at Cushing.

The problem—for producers and bullish hedge funds alike—is that there isn’t a quick solution to the storage problem. Shutting in wells takes time and even setting wells on fire—which some Russian producers are reportedly considering as one way to reduce output quickly—takes time.

This is time that many smaller oil producers don’t have, so bankruptcies are on the way. This would mean a more lasting decline in production, which is good news for bulls. The question remains whether this decline will happen soon enough. For now, this is highly unlikely, so we may see another massive selloff when the next front-month oil contract nears expiry.