Oil prices fall slightly despite worries over Libyan blockade

Singapore — Oil prices eased on Tuesday as investors appeared to shrug off earlier supply concerns following a force majeure declared by Libya on two oilfields amid a military blockade.

Brent crude was trading down 30c, or 0.5%, at $64.90 a barrel by 3.18am GMT, after rising to their highest in more than a week on Monday.

US West Texas Intermediate crude futures were down 14c, or 0.2%, at $58.40 a barrel.

“Every time we get a big geopolitical event, the market spikes up, but everybody looks at that as a chance of a selling opportunity,” said Tony Nunan, oil risk manager at Mitsubishi in Tokyo.

Two oilfields in southwest Libya began shutting down on Sunday after a pipeline was closed off, potentially reducing national output to a fraction of its normal level, the country’s National Oil Corporation (NOC) said.

A document sent to oil traders and seen by Reuters on Monday said the NOC had declared force majeure — a waiver on contractual obligations — on crude loadings from El Sharara and El Feel oilfields in Libya’s southwest.

If Libyan exports are halted for any sustained period, storage tanks will fill within days and production will slow to 72,000 barrels a day, an NOC spokesperson said. Libya has been producing about 1.2-million barrels a day recently.

Antigovernment unrest in Iraq, another oil producer, also had initially supported oil prices, but officials later said production in southern oilfields has not been affected by the unrest.

Any supply disruptions could be offset by increased output from the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec), which could limit the effect on global oil markets, the head of Japan’s petroleum industry body, Nunan said.

“We are caught in this ($65 a barrel) trading range,” he said. “Anything below and Opec is going to have a tough time balancing their budgets … and anything above, shale (output) will rebound.”

Another factor reassuring the market is Opec spare capacity, which stands in excess of 3-million barrels a day, of which the bulk sits in Saudi Arabia, analysts from ING Economics said in a note.

Adding to supply, Guyana exported its first shipment of crude on Monday, marking the tiny South American nation’s debut as an oil exporter.

Meanwhile, Bank of America Global Research raised its 2020 oil price forecasts on Monday, citing risks to supply from the Middle East, an improving demand outlook and higher Opec+ compliance to deepen output cuts.

Reuters