Dầu thô tiếp tục giảm giá trong tuần này

Hôm nay dầu thô phiên châu Á sáng nay vẫn chÆ°a thoát khỏi áp lá»±c giảm giá vì thị trường lo ngại nhu cầu tiêu thụ nhiên liệu sẽ giảm vì mùa tiêu dùng đỉnh Ä‘iểm qua Ä‘i.

Ngày lá»… lao Ä‘á»™ng hôm qua Ä‘ã Ä‘ánh dấu sá»± chấm dứt của “mùa lái xe.” Các nhà máy lọc dầu cÅ©ng thường Ä‘óng cá»­a các nhà máy vào thời gian này, tức tháng 9 và tháng 10, để bảo dưỡng, vừa do nhu cầu xăng giảm và cÅ©ng để chuẩn bị cho mùa sản xuất dầu sưởi ấm phục vụ trong mùa Ä‘ông.

 “Thị trường Ä‘ang phản ánh tình hình cung cao cầu yếu”, Jonathan Baratt tại Commodity Broking Service Pty nhận định. “Mùa lái xe Ä‘ã chấm dứt nhÆ°ng không mang lại tín hiệu tích cá»±c nào cho thị trường và Ä‘ó là má»™t khoảng thời gian thất bại.”

Hiện giá dầu thô WTI tại New York vào lúc 10h48 (giờ Việt Nam) Ä‘ang dao dịch ở mức 74,03 USD/thùng. Do Mỹ Ä‘óng cá»­a nghỉ lá»… Lao Ä‘á»™ng, nên thị trường giao dịch Ä‘óng cá»­a sá»›m. Đóng cá»­a phiên châu Âu hôm qua, giá dầu chốt ở mức 74,07 USD/thùng.

Xăng

TrÆ°á»›c Ä‘ây, các  nhà đầu tÆ° bi quan về thị trường xăng bởi nhu cầu suy giảm khi mùa lái xe kết thúc và các dữ liệu kinh tế bày tỏ những dấu hiệu không đồng nhất về công cuá»™c phục hồi. Tuy nhiên, các quỹ phòng vệ đều tin giá xăng sẽ tăng – lần đầu tiên trong gần 4 năm, bởi giá Ä‘ã giảm trong tuần cuối cùng của “mùa lái xe” ở Mỹ.

Trên sàn Nymex lúc 1h35 giờ New York, xăng tÆ°Æ¡ng lai giao tháng 10 giảm 0,64 cent xuống còn 1,9131 USD/gallon. Tuần trÆ°á»›c hợp đồng này giảm 1,5%.

Trong tuần cuối tháng 8, tiêu thụ xăng giảm 3,1% xuống thấp nhất trong 12 tuần. Tính ra trong 10 tuần vừa rồi thì 8 tuần tồn kho xăng tăng lên, và hiện Ä‘ang cao hÆ¡n 14% so vá»›i mức trung bình 5 năm. Tuần cuối tháng 8 thì tồn kho giảm 212.000 thùng xuống còn 225,4 triệu thùng.

Bão

CÆ¡n bão nhiệt Ä‘á»›i Hermine – gần cuối vịnh Mexico về phía Tây – có thể sẽ tiến vào đất liền trong ngày hôm nay. Vận tốc gió Ä‘ã mạnh lên khoảng 95km/h.

Crude Oil Falls for a Second Day on Speculation U.S. Fuel Demand Will Drop

By Ben Sharples - Sep 7, 2010 8:17 AM GMT+0700

Oil dropped for a second day in New York on speculation that fuel demand will decline as the U.S. summer peak consumption season ends.

Yesterday’s Labor Day holiday marks the end of the peak driving season. Refiners often idle units for maintenance in September and October as gasoline demand drops and before heating-oil use increases. U.S. crude inventories last week rose to the highest point since June, the Energy Department said.

“The market is reflecting on the fundamentals, the oversupply,” said Jonathan Barratt, managing director at Commodity Broking Services Pty in Sydney. “The summer drive time was a complete flop.”

The October contract fell 70 cents, or 1 percent, from the Sept. 3 close to $73.90 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange at 11:01 a.m. Sydney time. Prices are down 6.9 percent this year. Yesterday’s electronic trades are booked with today’s transactions for settlement purposes because there was no floor trading during the Labor Day holiday.

 “There have been concerns about China’s slowing economy but this slowing is quite relative,” said Alex Yap, a senior analyst in Singapore at Facts Global Energy, an oil-market research firm. “Asia’s demand is still there and we still have high utilization rates” of naphtha, he said.

Tropical Storm Hermine, near the western end of the Gulf of Mexico, may make landfall today. The weather system has sustained winds of about 60 miles (95 kilometers) per hour, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said in a website advisory just before 5 p.m. New York time.

Brent crude for October settlement dropped 23 cents, or 0.3 percent, to $76.64 a barrel on the ICE Futures Europe Exchange in London. The contract gained 20 cents, or 0.3 percent, to settle at $76.87 yesterday.

Hedge-fund bets against gasoline exceeded wagers that prices will rise for the first time in almost four years as the fuel fell in the final week of the U.S. driving season.

Net-short positions held by money managers in gasoline futures and options increased to 1,169 contracts the week ended Aug. 31, the first time speculators have been bearish since November 2006, according to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s weekly Commitments of Traders report. Hedge funds cut bullish bets for four straight weeks.

Investors have turned bearish on gasoline amid a slide in demand just as the motoring season ends and economic data sends mixed signals about U.S. recovery. While private employers added more workers than economists estimated in August, existing home sales homes grew at the slowest pace in more than a decade in July and orders for durable goods increased less than forecast.

“Money managers didn’t have a lot of reasons to have faith that consumers were back on their feet,” said Hamza Khan, an analyst at the Schork Group in Villanova, Pennsylvania.

Gasoline for October delivery dropped 0.64 cent to $1.9131 a gallon in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange as of 1:35 p.m. local time. Prices declined 1.5 percent last week.

Demand Slides

Gasoline demand slid 3.1 percent to a 12-week low in the seven days ended Aug. 27, MasterCard Inc. said in its weekly SpendingPulse report. The summer driving season, when consumption peaks, ends today with the U.S. Labor Day holiday.

Sales of existing houses plunged by a record 27 percent in July as a government tax credit expired, figures from the National Association of Realtors showed last month. Orders for durable goods advanced a less-than-forecast 0.3 percent in July, the Commerce Department reported Aug. 25. Private payrolls that exclude government jobs increased 67,000 in August, after a revised 107,000 jump in July, the Labor Department said July 3.

Gasoline inventories have risen in eight of the past 10 weeks and are 14 percent above the five-year average for the period, according to Energy Department data. Stockpiles fell 212,000 barrels to 225.4 million in the week ended Aug. 27, the department reported Sept. 1.

Net-short positions have climbed to the highest level since records began in 2006 amid a drop in trading, Khan said.

Open interest in gasoline futures, the total number of contracts or options that have not been closed, liquidated or delivered, fell 6.5 percent to 235,012 contracts in the week ended Aug. 31. Each contract represents 1,000 barrels.

‘Heart Not in It’

 “When we see a decrease in open interest, then the heart is not in it,” Khan said. “The low open interest implies this is stragglers and low-volume trading.”

Futures rose to a high of $2.1935 a gallon on Aug. 3 before sinking 16 percent to a low of $1.8494 on Aug. 24.

Net-long positions held by money managers in crude oil futures and options fell 4.1 percent to 78,695 contracts in the week ended Aug. 31, the fourth consecutive weekly decline and the lowest level since the seven days ended July 9. Net-short positions held by money managers in heating oil futures and options dropped 75 percent to 2,101, the first reversal in three weeks.

Crude oil futures for October delivery slid 0.7 percent to $74.08 a barrel today, following a 0.8 percent drop last week. Heating oil for October delivery fell 0.2 cent to $2.0556 a gallon, after being little changed last week.

The increase in short positions “is just a realization that gasoline supplies are substantially above a five-year average,” said Phil Flynn, vice president of research at PFGBest in Chicago. “Instead of clamoring to build new refinery capacity, we’re looking for new places to sell gasoline.”