石油生产商们似乎准备再次摊牌

据彭博社9月27日报道，石油生产国可能会在今年年底前再次摊牌，沙特阿拉伯和俄罗斯等石油大国在如何应对石油需求复苏停滞不前的问题上持有不同观点。

欧洲各地对旅行和社交聚会的重新限制，加上国家对企业的支持计划逐渐减少，对原油需求产生了严重影响。5月欧佩克+日产量创纪录地减少970万桶，而现在，石油生产国们开始考虑放松对产出的限制。而他们意见的不一致，将带来严重的市场危机。

过去两个月里，国际能源署（IEA）将原油日产量预期下调了40万桶，而欧佩克则将日产量预期下调了50万桶，未来可能还会进一步下调。IEA石油工业和市场部门主管尼尔?阿特金森(Neil Atkinson)周四表示，该机构对下一份月度报告的需求预测更有可能是下调而不是上调。

包括Emily Ashford和Paul Horsnell在内的渣打银行分析师上周在一份报告中称，石油需求面临的最大阻力来自贸易的减少、经济疲软以及企业关闭和失业的连锁反应。

在石油需求本应复苏的时候，又开始出现逆转。欧洲病毒感染病例增多，引发了新一轮的在家工作的建议和对社会活动的限制，这势必与经济支持措施相冲突。美国的石油消费也面临着类似的障碍，政府根据《冠状病毒援助、救济和经济安全法》提供的支持将于9月30日结束。亚洲也未能幸免，据渣打银行(Standard Chartered)的数据显示，泰国是唯一一个石油需求接近“v”型复苏的国家。

当然，这不全是需求的问题。来自欧佩克国家的额外供应空间还取决于来自其他地区的石油供应量，而在这方面的不确定性因素与需求的不确定性因素一样多。

人们担心，美国页岩油的产量将在未来几周或几个月里再次大幅下降。Emily Ashford警告称，目前美国的油井完井量非常低，可能很快就会出现月度产量大幅下滑。

美国能源信息署(EIA)公布的更为强劲的月度数据显示，今年美国国内原油产量降幅比上周初步数据显示的更大。如果美国产量再次下降，将为欧佩克+增加产量留出更多空间。

就连全球最大的石油交易商，像维托尔集团(Vitol Group)、托克集团(Trafigura Group)和摩科瑞能源集团(Mercuria Energy Group)等，这些石油巨头对未来几个月的石油前景也没有统一看法。摩科瑞首席执行官马尔科?杜兰德表示，欧佩克正计划从明年1月开始开采我们不需要的额外石油。托克集团的高管们很悲观，但维托尔集团较其竞争对手更为乐观。

由于存在诸多的不确定性，欧佩克+集团内部出现的紧张局势也就不足为奇了。对沙特阿拉伯来说，最重要的是要防止油价下滑，该国能源部长表示，欧佩克+将“先发制人”，阻止供应超过需求，让石油交易商“尽可能地紧张”。

俄罗斯总理亚历山大?诺瓦克(Alexander Novak)则更为谨慎，希望避免反复修改一份设定到2022年4月底的生产目标的协议。根据该协议，该集团将从1月初开始将其总产量再增加200万桶/天，而诺瓦克更愿意在做出改变决定之前尽可能地多观察市场情况，保持谨慎。

值得注意的是，今年3月份，欧佩克内部也曾出现过类似的分歧，当时俄罗斯希望维持现状，而沙特阿拉伯寻求进一步减产，这引发了一场短暂的“混战”，导致油价跌破每桶20美元。

王佳晶 摘译自 彭博社

原文如下：

Oil Heavyweights Look Ready for a Showdown

Oil producers could be set for another showdown before the end of the year, with heavyweights Saudi Arabia and Russia holding different views on how to approach the halting recovery in oil demand.

Renewed restrictions on travel and social gatherings across Europe, along with the tapering of state support packages for companies, are having a chilling effect on demand for crude, just as the OPEC+ group of oil producers, who cut production by a record 9.7 million barrels a day in May, begin to contemplate the next easing of limits on their output. We should all remember what happened last time they couldn’t agree on what to do.

The International Energy Agency and the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries have both resumed cutting their forecasts for this year’s oil demand. In the past two months, the IEA has trimmed its forecast by 400,000 barrels a day, while OPEC has reduced its own by 500,000 barrels. And they may have further yet to fall. Neil Atkinson, the IEA’s Head of Oil Industry and Markets Division, said at a Bloomberg event on Thursday that the agency is “more likely to make a downgrade than an upgrade” to demand forecasts in its next monthly report.

The biggest headwind to oil demand comes from reduced trade, weakened economies and the knock-on effects of business closings and job losses, Standard Chartered analysts, including Emily Ashford and Paul Horsnell, said in a report last week.

At a time when oil demand was meant to be recovering, it now seems to be going into reverse again. A new round of work-from-home advice and restrictions on social activities, triggered by a rise in virus infections in Europe, are set to collide with a reduction in economic support measures. U.S. oil consumption faces similar obstacles, with government support under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act coming to an end on September 30. Even Asia isn’t immune, with Thailand the only country that’s close to seeing a V-shaped recovery in oil demand, according to Standard Chartered.

Of course, it’s not all about demand. The room available for additional supply from the OPEC+ countries also depends on how much oil is coming from elsewhere. And there is at least as much uncertainty on this front as there is with demand.

There are fears — or hopes, if you’re a rival oil producer — that output from U.S. shale deposits is set for another big drop in the coming weeks and months. Well completions in the U.S. are now so low that large monthly declines in production may be imminent, Emily Ashford warned last week.

More robust monthly data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration show that this year’s drop in domestic crude production has been both steeper and deeper than their preliminary weekly data suggested. Another drop in U.S. production would leave more room for the OPEC+ group to raise its own output.

Even the world's biggest oil traders — including Vitol Group, Trafigura Group and Mercuria Energy Group — don't have a united view on the outlook for oil over the coming months. Mercuria co-founder and CEO Marco Durnand says “we do not need the extra oil” that the OPEC+ group is planning to pump from January. Trafigura executives are also downbeat. But Vitol has a starkly more bullish view than its rivals.

With so much uncertainty, it’s little surprise that tensions are emerging within the OPEC+ group.

Saudi Arabia wants, above all, to prevent oil prices from slipping, and its energy minister says the OPEC+ producer group will be “proactive and preemptive” to stop supply from running ahead of demand. He wants to make oil traders “as jumpy as possible.”

His Russian counterpart Alexander Novak is more cautious, wanting to avoid repeatedly revising a deal that sets out production targets to the end of April 2022. That agreement sees the group adding another 2 million barrels a day to their collective production from the beginning of January (see the chart above), and Novak prefers to wait as long as possible before making a decision to alter that.

We’ve all seen where a standoff between the two big beasts of the OPEC+ group can lead. There was a similar disagreement back in March, with Russia wanting to preserve the status quo and Saudi Arabia seeking deeper output cuts, that sparked a brief production free-for-all that helped push oil prices below $20 a barrel. Nobody wants a repeat of that.