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How will the Government’s move to convert major port trusts into port authorities benefit private firms investing in these ports? It does seem like the Government intends to do away with the Tariff Authority for Major Ports (TAMP) and that is definitely something we welcome. It is an important step towards a more market-driven pricing for the (major) ports. The legislation is yet to be passed by Parliament. So, I think we should wait for that to happen first. APMT-run Gateway Terminals at JNPT has been one of the worst ...

Chicago soybean futures on Monday dropped to their lowest in more than 10 years, pressured by concerns that an escalation in the trade war between Washington and Beijing would further hit U.S. exports of the oilseed. The most-active soybean contract on the Chicago Board of Trade had dropped 0.8% to $8.03 a bushel, as of 0626 GMT, after earlier marking its lowest since December 2008 at $7.99-1/2 a bushel. Corn lost 0.6% to $3.49-1/2 a bushel, and wheat was down 0.7% at $4.22 a bushel. "China has not yet announced ...

Brazilian miner Vale sees the possibility of reaching the 400 million mt iron ore output levels within two to three years, Chief Financial Officer Luciano Siani Pires said. “Considering the 90 million mt that are currently standing, a third of it is related to Brucutu, another third is related to the dry operations of Alegria, Timbopeba and Vargem Grande, and the other third is related to wet mining,” said Siani Pires during an earnings conference call. “We expect Brucutu to return soon, and the other one-third related to the other ...

U.S. farmers have raised an outcry against Washington’s latest move to increase tariffs on Chinese imports, warning of serious consequences for U.S. farms and families as the trade tensions drag on. Washington on Friday increased additional tariffs on 200 billion U.S. dollars’ worth of Chinese imports from 10 percent to 25 percent, a move Beijing said it deeply regrets and will be forced to respond to with necessary countermeasures. In a joint statement, the U.S. National Association of Wheat Growers (NAWG), the American Soybean Association (ASA) and the National Corn ...

A crash in Australian thermal coal prices is raising fresh questions about the viability of a controversial $4 billion coal mine just a week ahead of a national election in which climate change is a key issue. Final approval of the Carmichael coal mine in Queensland, owned by India’sAdani Enterprises , should come in “a matter of weeks, not months” following nearly a decade on the drawing board, the company’s mining chief executive, Lucas Dow, told Reuters last month. Adani has said it is aiming to start producing 10 million ...

“Previous experience shows the escalation of trade tensions always has a negative impact on the copper price, as the market believes that increased tariffs will have a negative impact on global economic activity and, therefore, on copper demand. A trade war between the two largest economies also raises the spectre of a global recession. However, after the announcement today, the copper price actually ticked higher on both the SHFE and LME exchanges. It is believed that some money from the Chinese government has gone into the Chinese stock market to ...

Tensions in key international waterways could drive up oil prices this year, according to RBC Capital Markets head of global commodity strategy Helima Croft. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani announced Wednesday his country would end its compliance with two particular conditions of the nuclear deal if Europe did not step in to protect the country from U.S. sanctions. Tehran has previously threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s busiest transit lane for seaborne oil shipments. Approximately 20% of all seaborne crude and condensates passes through the Strait of Hormuz, ...

The Offshore Technology Conference (OTC) in Houston, Texas celebrates its 50th birthday this week, begging the question – what will the next 50 years hold for the offshore market? Luckily, the data can provide some clues. Rystad Energy – the independent energy research and consultancy headquartered in Norway with offices across the globe – has analyzed the historical investments and oilfield service purchases of the world’s 50,000 oil and gas fields (1). While the forecast is uncertain, our analysis paints a fascinating picture of how offshore could contribute to the ...

Pessimism is back in vogue in the oil markets, as investors bet sputtering trade talks and swelling US output can kill crude’s rally. Hedge funds lifted bearish bets on West Texas Intermediate crude by 39 per cent, the biggest short-selling surge in more than eight months. Meanwhile, bets on a rally retreated for the second straight week. Crude futures slipped to their third weekly loss in a row on Friday after high-level talks between the US and China broke up, with President Donald Trump’s administration giving China a month to ...

June 1 marks the official beginning of Hurricane Season in the Atlantic. While only two hurricanes made landfall in 2018, they were extraordinarily destructive and led to more than $50 billion in damage. Weather forecasters are already offering a first look at the 2019 tropical weather season and conditions this year appear favorable for a more active season in the Gulf of Mexico, and along the Atlantic coast of the southeast U.S. There is one industry that is watching this outlook particularly closely and that’s the liquefied natural gas (LNG) ...

The US LNG sector faces new market uncertainties after Washington followed through on threats to raise tariffs to 25% on $200 billion in Chinese goods and Beijing promised retaliation. Amid negotiations in Washington on a trade deal Friday, President Donald Trump continued to espouse benefits of tariffs, and said paperwork was underway to extend 25% tariffs to another $325 billion in Chinese goods. The escalations threatened to deepen the chill on long-term deals between Chinese state-owned enterprises and US LNG developers working to get projects off the ground to be ...

European reloads – an important flexible source of supply in recent summers – have disappeared from view this year with current forward spreads meaning the arbitrage window is not open. Europe’s location and depth of traded gas markets have supported reload activity in recent years, with more of a focus on sourcing volumes from northwest Europe than historically-favoured Spain. But the global oversupply that kicked in from late 2018 has meant the market has other supply options. The viability of reloads depends on a number of factors, including the availability ...

U.S. refiners had a plan for 2020: use their complex operations to maximize profits by making products that would comply with new international laws capping sulfur content in shipping fuels. But after a series of unexpected market moves, heavy, sour crude oil processed by U.S. refiners has become more expensive, eating up hoped-for profit windfalls before they even materialized, forcing refiners to rethink plans to invest more in heavy crude processing units. New regulations by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) will require ships globally to use fuels with a sulfur ...

Over the next five years, crude processing capacity is set to expand by about 5 million barrels per day (bpd), while non-refinery sources of supply will add a further 1 million bpd. At the same time, demand is expected to grow by about 4 million bpd, which leaves a surplus of about 2 million bpd. This situation – which has a number of causes, one of which could be apparent poor capital discipline – means existing refiners, many of whom have smaller assets, will face some difficult decisions. Global oil ...

Western integrated oil majors posted a mixed set of first-quarter earnings results, with most continuing to grow production and some proving resilient to the impact of lower oil and gas prices and weaker refining margins. In an earnings season overshadowed by a multi-billion-dollar bidding war for US independent Anadarko, the sector failed to match its recent run of bullish cash flow and earnings growth. But profits from trading oil and gas helped pull European majors above the pack during a quarter that average Brent prices were 5% lower on the ...