Saudi Aramco cut the price of its main oil grade to buyers in Asia after OPEC+ continued with its outsized output increases for a third month.
The Saudis led the producer group over the weekend in agreeing to raise production by 411,000 barrels a day in July, a third straight month of outsized hikes. In tandem with US President Donald Trump’s trade war, the supply increases have helped drive benchmark oil prices about 12% lower in London since early April.
Ghana’s major offshore oil assets include the Jubilee Field, operated by Tullow Oil, as well as the TEN and Sankofa fields, with players including Kosmos Energy, PetroSA, and the state-owned GNPC.
South Africa has officially launched the South African National Petroleum Company (SANPC), a new state-owned oil enterprise designed to consolidate and energize the country’s long-stalled hydrocarbons sector. Formed from the merger of PetroSA, iGas, and the Strategic Fuel Fund, SANPC will operate under the Central Energy Fund and is already integrating staff and assets to streamline operations. The aim? Reducing oil imports, bolstering energy security, and tapping into over R95 billion in potential investment.
TotalEnergies said it is developing a competitive portfolio that integrates renewable sources with flexible assets to provide clean, reliable power to its customers. By the end of March 2025, TotalEnergies said it expects to have 28 GW of installed gross renewable electricity generation capacity, aiming to achieve 35 GW by the end of 2025 and exceed 100 TWh of net electricity production by 2030.
Egypt is once again facing a resurgence of natural gas shortages, drawing headlines as the country enters the peak summer season. With soaring temperatures above 40°C expected in the coming months, electricity demand—driven largely by air conditioning—is putting intense pressure on the national grid. In response, the Cairo government is scrambling to implement emergency measures to avoid blackouts.
The European Union is preparing to impose up to €100 billion ($113 billion) in tariffs on US goods if trade talks fail, according to a new report by Bloomberg this morning.
The draft list of retaliatory measures will be circulated to member states as early as Wednesday, with a one-month consultation period before finalization.
Russia saw its budget revenues from oil and gas drop by 12% in April from a year earlier, due to the oil price rout last month, the Russian finance ministry said on Wednesday.
Oil and gas revenues for the Kremlin dipped to $13.45 billion (1.09 trillion Russian rubles) in April, from $15.2 billion (1.23 trillion rubles) in the same month of last year.
For the first four months of the year, oil and gas revenues fell by 10.3% to $46 billion (3.73 trillion rubles), according to the ministry’s data.
The contract, issued as a Limited Notice to Proceed (LNTP), allows MODEC to begin early-phase work on the FPSO while awaiting regulatory and government approvals. Phase one of the project will involve front-end engineering and design (FEED), followed by engineering, procurement, construction, and installation (EPCI) in phase two—pending final project sanction by ExxonMobil Guyana and its Stabroek Block co-venturers.
The Hammerhead FPSO will have a production capacity of 150,000 barrels of oil per day, along with processing facilities for associated gas and water. It will be moored in approximately 1,025 meters of water using a SOFEC spread mooring system.
The LNTP enables MODEC to begin FPSO design activities to support an early project startup target of 2029, should approvals move forward.
The March export numbers could be a glimpse into what’s coming, but not immediately. In fact, some analysts expect a slowdown in Chinese exports in the coming months while the dust from the tariffs settles. “Exports will likely weaken in coming months as the U.S. tariffs [have] skyrocketed,” Zhiwei Zhang, president and chief economist at Pinpoint Asset Management, told CNBC. He added that “in the short term, I expect chaos in supply chains and potential shortage in the U.S. that may drive up inflation.”
“The risks to our reduced oil price forecast are to the downside, especially for 2026, given growing risks of recession and to a lesser extent of higher OPEC+ supply,” Godman said in one of its earlier April notes, referring to the most expected outcome of the tariff war that President Trump started in early April. However, there is a good chance the war will end before it start hitting the global economy, eliminating the biggest risks as defined by Goldman Sachs and thus reducing the danger of a more serious oil price decline.