Crude oil analysts are in a rush to revise their forecasts in the wake of Israel’s attacks on Iran as geopolitics trumps fundamentals yet again.
“Oil could spike toward $80 if Middle East tensions escalate and supply risks materialize, but rising OPEC+ output may cap gains and revive oversupply concerns into autumn,” Saxo Markets chief investment strategist Charu Chanana said, as quoted by Bloomberg.
NextDecade has revised the pricing on an existing EPC contract with Bechtel Energy for Train 4 at the Rio Grande LNG facility in Texas and signed a new EPC contract with the company for Train 5, NextDecade announced on Thursday.
FourPhase, a solids and production performance specialist for the oil and gas sector, has announced a new agreement with Shell Trinidad and Tobago. The master service agreement (MSA) involves sand management and production optimization for Shell Trinidad & Tobago on its topside offshore oil and gas platforms in the Caribbean.
Oceaneering International, Inc. (Oceaneering) announced today that its Offshore Projects Group (OPG) segment has entered into a vessel services agreement with a major operator for use of the MPSV Harvey Deep Sea.
Chevron and Halliburton have jointly developed a new process that enables closed-loop, feedback-driven completions in Colorado. This intelligent fracturing process combines automated stage execution with subsurface feedback to optimize delivery of energy into the wellbore without relying on human intervention. The capability enhances the previous implementation of autonomous hydraulic fracturing technology.
“We have reached a framework to implement the Geneva consensus and the call between the two presidents,” U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said, as quoted by Reuters. “The idea is we’re going to go back and speak to President Trump and make sure he approves it. They’re going to go back and speak to President Xi and make sure he approves it, and if that is approved, we will then implement the framework.”
A week ago, the 39th OPEC and non-OPEC Ministerial Meeting was held via videoconference, chaired by Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman Al-Saud, Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Energy. According to a press release, the group pledged to “develop a mechanism to assess the maximum sustainable production capacity (MSC) of member countries that will be used as reference for 2027 production baselines”.
It has been over two years since the Baghdad-based Federal Government of Iraq (FGI) placed an embargo on independent oil exports from the Erbil-based Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI). The legal basis for the halting of these essential flows to the finances of the semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan was the International Chamber of Commerce’s (ICC) order that they would not be resumed until Turkey paid the FGI the US$1.5 billion in damages for these allegedly unauthorised oil exports over many previous years.
With crude oil prices dropping into the low $60s per barrel, profitability in the oil and gas industry is under pressure, squeezing cash flows and forcing companies to reassess their capital allocation. As a result, upstream investments are expected to decline. Early signals from the peer group of majors support this trend, as they indicate plans to prioritize shareholder returns—particularly dividends and buybacks—over new investments.
Kazakhstan’s national oil and gas company KazMunayGas is looking to borrow cheaper funds from overseas debt issues, including bonds denominated in Chinese yuan, the firm’s chief executive Askhat Khassenov told Bloomberg.
“We looked at all options. Currently there is a possibility to sell dim sum, panda bonds,” Khassenov said in an interview with Bloomberg published on Wednesday.