The man who drove the Trainer acquisition has left Delta Airlines
If there was ever a “think out of the box” deal in 2012, it was Delta Airlines’ purchase of the Trainer refinery, near Philadelphia, from Phillips 66. The man who from all accounts was central to that...
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The InterContinental Exchange — the mouse that roared — takes on the Big Board
In the year 2000, a tiny upstart energy exchange was born in Atlanta, Georgia. It began by building an electronic trading system for electricity and natural gas, something that was a popular idea at...
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What the price of gold is telling us about the price of oil, 2012 edition
It’s time to ask, as we sometimes do: is the price of gold too high relative to oil, or is it the other way around? The answer: it may depend on the Brent/WTI spread. Taking a look at the ratio of gold...
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Delta’s plot for refinery success: Planes, Trainer and Automobiles
In the movie Planes, Trains and Automobiles, Steve Martin and John Candy have problems with every one of those modes of transportation on their journey home. Delta Air Lines ponders a similar plotline...
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What’s on the surface doesn’t reflect good days for European oil storage firms
European demand is down, most markets are in backwardation… Terrible time for the continent’s storage industry, right? Definitely not. Speakers, questioners and commenters at the Platts European Oil...
View ArticleA sea change for US jet fuel: record net exports for 2012
Think the jets to Europe and Latin America are packed? Try the ships carrying jet fuel. The idling of a major Caribbean refinery last year helped speed along a net export trend for US jet fuel, with a...
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More on RINs and ethanol: the RFA fires back
Bob Dineen, the head of the Renewable Fuels Association, is one of the energy industry’s most notable success stories in Washington. Outside of losing the blender’s ethanol credit a few years ago,...
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Thoughts from Boca: not a lot of hostility on display
Three long days and very late nights with 1,004 registrants at the annual Futures Industry Association Conference in Boca Raton, Florida, certainly had its moments of industry optimism and gossip....
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Heating oil’s future doesn’t look so hot in the US
Heating oil as we know it is slowly but surely vanishing. CME Group will officially switch the basis of the NYMEX heating oil futures contract from actual heating oil to ultra low sulfur diesel on...
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Recent crude-carrying train derailments in US heat up crude by rail safety...
Two trains carrying crude oil derailed in the US this month, making headlines that garnered more attention to a recent debate over the in-vogue shipping method’s environmental impact. The popularity of...
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The commodity super cycle: Citi declares it has come to an end
On a day when gold plummeted and oil dropped right alongside it, Citi Research was throwing dirt on the grave of the commodity super cycle. The then-Goldman Sachs Commodity Index hit its bottom in...
View ArticlePetrodollars: Tighter Brent-WTI spread raises new challenges for refiners
The wide Brent-WTI spread has meant enormous profits for US refiners lucky enough to take advantage of it. But it’s not as wide now, and that is bringing a new set of issues for those same companies....
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Making money in Hawaii’s oil market is like pushing a boulder up a volcano
They like to say around the Platts office in Houston that California is an island. An economic island, that is. The kind where the spot prices of gasoline and other refined fuels are insulated from the...
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ICYMI: Biden and Keystone, US oil import balance, Brent/WTI
A few random things at the end of the week: –It’s almost a week old, but it took a few days for this report to pop up on the web. Vice President Joe Biden gave a hint late last week that the Keystone...
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Commodities trading: not for the faint-hearted
Once the darling of hedge funds, commodities are now looking like a poisoned chalice. Last year, hedge funds such as BlueGold, which specialized in crude oil; Centaurus, in natural gas; and Fortress...
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Chicago jet fuel prices soar to highest in the world
Airlines flying from Houston to Chicago may want to load up on something other than passengers at the start of the trip — extra jet fuel. Landlocked Chicago has the highest jet fuel price by far of any...
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Taking it apart: The US LNG export fight
There are few, if any, US energy policy decisions that are being more fiercely debated than the fate of liquefied natural gas exports. With a recent, high-profile approval from the Department of...
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Maersk takes players on drilling rig in ‘Quest for Oil’ computer game
The last time you filled up your tank, did you wonder where the gasoline came from? How did it begin life? And where did the crude oil come from that gave us gasoline? Now you can go digging — or...
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The new American Airlines may trim the jet fuel hedges off
Sometimes airlines are just like any neighborhood. If all your neighbors have a dream car (or Dreamliner), you’ll want one, too. If all your neighbors have internet access (at 30,000 feet), you’ll want...
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The new world of oil cocktails: a blending boom
What do you get when you mix a diversifying, expanding oil infrastructure with a growing proliferation of new mostly, lighter sweet crude grades? You get traders jumping in offering crude blending for...
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