Headlines
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Fed decision turns investor’s interest to precious metals
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Most base metals lower on LME
Brent and Distillates
Oil prices extended their gains for a third session on Wednesday aiming towards the 50$/b after a surprise move by the FED to buy government bonds on a large scale revived hopes the battered U.S. economy could soon begin its recovery. Also OPEC decision, that further supply cuts are possible if the market remained weak, added to higher crude prices. In this context US inventories data showing larger increases than expected in crude oil and gasoline stocks could hardly change the price movement.
US crude stocks rose 2 mln.b last week, double the consensus, following a rise in imports and refineries conducting more seasonal maintenance. Gasoline stocks gained 3.2 mln.b, confounding the consensus forecast for a drop of 1.2 mln.b. On the contrary distillate stocks rose by 100 kb again expectations of 700 kb gains.
China has bought a 1.8 mln.b crude cargo from Africa for its emergency reserve tanks in eastern China. The cargo is scheduled to call at the eastern port city of Ningbo, where one of the country's first four storage bases is located, by around mid-April.
Mexico discovered more crude oil and natural gas in 2008 than it took out of the ground for the first time in years, President Felipe Calderon said on Wednesday. New discoveries left Mexico's total oil and gas reserves at 43.6 bln.b of crude equivalent at the end of 2008.
Nigeria has chosen 15 companies, mostly from the U.S., Europe and Asia, to be core investors in the exploration and production of its natural gas reserves, the world's seventh largest, its oil minister said on Wednesday. The selected companies, which include Royal Dutch Shell, Russia's Gazprom and U.S. Chevron, are expected in the next few weeks to submit proposals to the government on how they will work with state-run oil firm NNPC to develop the domestic gas sector.
