Today, we have “lies, fake news and statistics” rather than the old phrase “lies, damned lies and statistics”. But the general principle is still the same.  Cynical players simply focus on the numbers that promote their argument, and ignore or challenge everything else.

The easiest way for them to manipulate the statistics is to ignore the wider context and focus on a single “shock, horror” story.  So the chart above instead combines 5 “shock, horror”  stories, showing quarterly oil production since 2015:

• Iran is in the news following President Trump’s decision to abandon the nuclear agreement, which began in July 2015.  OPEC data shows its output has since risen from 2.9 Mbd in Q2 2015 to 3.8 Mbd in April – ‘shock, horror’.
• Russia has also been much in the news since joining the OPEC output agreement in November 2016.  But in reality, it has done little.  Its production was 11 Mbd in Q3 2016 and was 11.1 Mbd in April- ‘shock, horror’.
• Saudi Arabia leads OPEC: its production has fallen from 10.6 Mbd in Q3 2016 to 9.9 Mbd in April- ‘shock, horror’!
• Venezuela is an OPEC member, but its production decline began long before the OPEC deal.  The country’s economic collapse has seen oil output fall from 2.4 Mbd in Q4 2015 to just 1.5 Mbd in April- ‘shock, horror’.
• The USA, along with Iran, has been the big winner over the past two years.  Its output initially fell from 9.5 Mbd in Q1 2015 to 8.7 Mbd in Q3 2016, but has since soared by nearly 2 Mbd to 10.6 Mbd in April- ‘shock, horror’.

But overall, output in these 5 key countries rose from 35.5 Mbd in Q1 2015 to 36.9 Mbd in April.  Not much “shock, horror” there over a 3 year period.  More a New Normal story of “Winners and Losers”.

So why, you might ask, has the oil price rocketed from $27/bbl in January 2016 to $45/bbl in June last year and $78/bbl last Friday?  Its a good question, as there have been no physical shortages reported anywhere in the world to cause prices to nearly treble. The answer lies in the second chart from John Kemp at Reuters:

• It shows combined speculative purchases in futures markets by hedge funds since 2013
• These hit a low of around 200 Mbbls in January 2016 (2 days supply)
• They then more than trebled to around 700 mmbls by December 2016 (7 days supply)
• After halving to around 400 Mbbls in June 2017, they have now trebled to 1.4 Mbbls today (14 days supply)

Speculative buying, by definition, isn’t connected with the physical market, as OPEC’s Secretary General noted after meeting the major funds recently:  “Several of them had little or no experience or even a basic understanding of how the physical market works.”

This critical point is confirmed by Citi analyst Ed Morse: “There are large investors in energy, and they don’t care about talking to people who deal with fundamentals. They have no interest in it.”

Their concern instead is with movements in currencies or interest rates – or with the shape of the oil futures curve itself. As the head of the $8 billion Aspect fund has confirmed:

“The majority of our inputs, the vast majority, are price-driven. And the overwhelming factor we capitalise on is the tendency of crowd behaviour to drive medium-term trends in the market.” (my emphasis).

OIL PRICES ARE NOW AT LEVELS THAT USUALLY LEAD TO RECESSION

Hedge funds have been the real winners from all the “shock, horror” stories. These created the essential changes in “crowd behavior”, from which they could profit.  But now they are leaving the party – and the rest of will suffer the hangover, as the 3rd chart warns:

• Oil prices now represent 3.1% of global GDP, based on latest IMF data and 2018 forecasts
• This level has been linked with a US recession on almost every occasion since 1970
• The only exception was post-2009 when China and the Western central banks ramped-up stimulus
• The stimulus simply created a debt-financed bubble

The reason is simple.  People only have so much cash to spend. If they have to spend it on gasoline and heating their home, they can’t spend it on all the other things that drive the wider economy. Chemical markets are already confirming that demand destruction is taking place.:

• Companies have completely failed to pass through today’s high energy costs. For example:
• European prices for the major plastic, low density polyethylene, averaged $1767/t in April with Brent at $72/bbl
• They averaged $1763/t in May 2016 when Brent was $47/bbl (based on ICIS pricing data)

Even worse news may be around the corner.  Last week saw President Trump decide to withdraw from the Iran deal. His daughter also opened the new US embassy to Jerusalem. Those with long memories are already wondering whether we could now see a return to the geopolitical crisis in summer 2008.

As I noted in July 2008, the skies over Greece were then “filled with planes” as Israel practiced for an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.  Had the attack gone ahead, Iran would almost certainly have closed the Strait of Hormuz.  It is just 21 miles wide (34km)  at its narrowest point, and carries 35% of all seaborne oil exports, 17mb/d.

As Mark Twain wisely noted, “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes”.  Prudent companies and investors need now to look beyond the “market-moving, shock, horror” headlines in today’s oil markets.  We must all learn to form our own judgments about the real risks that might lie ahead.