‘Record US oil exports set to increase further’

LONDON / Reuters

Already record US oil exports are set to surge further in the coming month as stored oil in one of the world’s last areas of excess stockpiles pours into global markets, the chief executive of trading house Mercuria, Marco Dunand, said.
The US shale oil revolution upended global energy markets, and in late September the country’s oil exports hit a record 1.98 million barrels per day (bpd). But Dunand said the surplus of oil in tanks meant more was likely to come.
“I think the volume that’s going to be exported from the US in the next two or three weeks is unprecedented in size,” Dunand told the Reuters Global Commodities Summit, adding levels could hit 2.2 million bpd.
“Looking at the vessel fixtures of recent times, I think we’re going to see record exports over the next month.” The United States lifted its nearly 40-year ban on oil exports in late 2015. As US crude production continues to rise, its oil has found buyers in nearly every refining hub from Europe to Venezuela to China and India. Dunand said after “hundreds of millions of barrels” had departed tanks and floating storage elsewhere in the world over the past year, the United States is an outlier of excess. “The US has an excess of crude stocks. Product stocks are more or less in line,” Dunand said.