Crude Little Changed, Brazilian Strike Causes Supply Worries
Jul 15th, 2008 | By Doug Casey | Category: Oil Investment & Alternative EnergyIn the energy market Monday, crude for August delivery vacillated through a $4 range between high and low, settling at a nervous $145.18, up 10 cents. August reformulated was essentially unchanged, at $3.558/gallon.
Traders reacted to the beginning of a scheduled five-day walkout by workers for Brazil’s Petrobras. The strike will idle oil output of about 400,000 barrels a day.
Analysts hastened to say that the strike is unlikely to significantly impact production. Petrobras (PBR) has implemented a contingency plan and announced that production was down only 7% in the first day of the strike.
Still, 13 platforms in Brazil’s Campos Basin—responsible for 80% of the country’s production—are participating, and 33 of Petrobras’s 42 platforms in the region are expected to join in.
Elsewhere, President Bush announced the lifting of a ban on drilling in offshore U.S. waters, a move seen as largely symbolic. While his executive order “will put pressure on national lawmakers and local governments, it is not by itself sufficient to conquer a complex web of competing incentives,” wrote analysts at Friedman Billings Ramsey.
Source: Crude Little Changed, Brazilian Strike Causes Supply Worries
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