WTI $66.88 -$2.12, Brent $70.54 -$2.00, Diff $3.66 +12c, NG $3.87 -13c

Oil price

The oil price fell yesterday during the day giving back some of the gains from Tuesday as the market digested the accord between Baghdad and Erbil. Later on however the API stats came out and as is often the case the analysts were a country mile away from the actual number and WTI in particular rallied after that. With consensus of a build of 1.3m barrels imagine the look on their little faces when the scribblers saw that it was actually a draw of 6.5m barrels…

Sundry

A massively quiet news day today with no announcements I can find, quite good really as i am heading to Interactive Investors to record my current thoughts on the sector.

The market was obviously quiet yesterday as all I heard was the puffing out of that old bid rumour that Shell were going to hoover up BP, now its right never to say never but I would be quite surprised if that was what BvB had in mind when he took over back in February. When you look at it selling off a large amount of assets in the first half of this year looks pretty smart with 20-20 hindsight.

Pantheon had results yesterday and I am very much looking forward to interviewing Jay Cheatham, CEO next week. One thing I will want to ask is whether the drilling programme is slipping, I noticed yesterday that a rig was being looked for ‘actively’ but not yet signed up and that the two wells ‘might’ be drilled back to back which is also a sign of possible delay. I am a big fan of what Pantheon are doing and to chatting to Jay about it next week.

I watched the Xcite presentation at Oilbarrel yesterday and remained of the same view, whilst there is significant value in the Bentley field it still has quite a way to run and until there are signs of a farm-out being consummated it may underperform.

Finally as I mentioned yesterday, I was very fortunate to get Premier Oil CEO, Tony Durrant into TipTV yesterday and he gave me a splendid interview with a good round up of how the company is as well placed as any to weather the current storm. Watch the full interview here

http://www.tiptv.co.uk/archives/premier-oil-ceo-interview-with-malcolm-graham-wood/

 

And finally…

Last night saw the HubCap Stealers come back from a goal down to win 1-3 at Leicester with the aid of Stevie G, Utd beat Stoke and there were wins for the Hammers at the Baggies, for Villa and Swansea while Burnley and the Magpies ended all square.

Tonight sees some very interesting fixtures, the Gooners host the Saints, there is a London Derby at the Bridge as Spurs go there, the Toffees host the Tigers and the Maccams, fresh from a huge result at the weekend have to do it all over again hosting the Noisy Neighbours.

And the funeral of Phillip Hughes took place overnight, as expected it was a really emotional affair with the eyes of the sporting world on it.