The current hysteria about the “oil heart attack of the Russian economy” is painfully reminiscent in its pathos of the famous: “Boss, everything is lost! The plaster is removed! The client is leaving!"Suffice it to compare this movie quote with a message widely circulated on the RuNet, republished, including by the famous Telegram channel “Nezygar”:
“Russia is being squeezed out of the European oil market by Saudi Arabia! For the second week in a row, oil traders are unable to sell a single barrel of Russian Urals oil to Europe through ports.! For Russia, this means a collapse in export revenues in March and, likely, in April!»
Immediately visible, that true professionals have entered into the matter, true masters of information warfare, who can “tell the truth” without blinking an eye, only the truth, nothing, except the truth,.. but not the whole truth".
To show the process technology, let's say it again, and then we will analyze the key phrase point by point: “For the second week in a row, oil traders cannot sell a single barrel of Russian Urals oil to Europe through ports”.
Where to begin? The fish rots from the head, but the last one is remembered. So let's start from the tail..
“They can’t sell to Europe...”
And where in general, properly, Russia has sold and is selling its oil?
The total volume of exports of our “black gold” to 2019 I have made 267,5 million tons (growth relative to 2018 g. — 6,9 million tons, or 2,7%). Main importing countries: China — 69,6 million tons, Netherlands - 46,2 million tons, US - 21,1 million tons, Germany - 18,9 million tons, Belarus - 18 million tons, The Republic of Korea - 15,3 million tons, Italy - 14,6 million tons, Poland - 13,3 million tons, Finland - 9,9 million tons and Türkiye - 8,2 million tons. In total, this “top ten” accounts for 235,1 million tons, or almost 88% Russian exports.
At the same time, China, USA, Byelorussia, Korea and Türkiye are not Europe at all, but these four countries account for 132,1 million tons of Russian crude oil exports. Let's minus this number, in which, by the way, buyers of our oil from Ukraine did not enter, Georgia, Baltic republics and so on. Nothing is missing here, orders are not canceled, clients don't leave...
Go ahead.
“They can’t sell through the ports...”
This is an even more important and even funny clarification. And what share of Russian oil going specifically to Europe is sold through ports?? Do tankers go from Russia to Finland or to Poland?? How much oil does the pipeline receive from us?, eg, Germany?
Here, too, is the "secret of polyshinel": at 2019 year, “oil pipeline” exports to Europe by the Russian Transneft amounted to 43,9 million tons, that is, it was reduced by whole 13% due to April deliveries of “black gold” contaminated with organochlorines.
Let's subtract this number too..
What remains? Remains “unallocated” 112,6 million tons, who left through Russian ports for far abroad countries 2019 year. Went to China by tankers 29,6 million tons, to the USA and Korea - apparently, the entire volume, t. it is. all of them 36,4 million tons.
Consequently, we are talking, in the worst case for Russia, about 46,6 million tons of oil, or about 17,4% Russian exports. The share is considerable, but not catastrophic - even if all of it suddenly disappears for some reason.
“Oil traders cannot sell...”
Oil trader, usually, sell “free” volumes of black gold - in addition to long-term ones (thermal) contracts, components no less 90% physical oil market. The prices of these contracts are usually tied to exchange quotations, but not directly, and according to a complex formula, agreed upon by the parties to the transaction, in each case - your own. So “exchange” oil accounts for less 10% supplies.
But what is “exchange” oil anyway?? it, inherently, speculative paper oil market, on which a tiny fraction of the total volume of concluded contracts is executed (According to various sources, in the range of 1–5%). For other contracts, the difference between the contract price and the current price for the “lifeblood of the economy” is simply paid..
by the way, how much oil traders sold in the same two weeks of Saudi oil? I suspect, what... zero, because Saudi Aramco is a state monopoly. And for now it is limited to “verbal aggression”, offering potential buyers more and more volumes and greater discounts.
But it is so, by the way.
“They can’t sell for the second week in a row...”
How else should a speculative market behave?, when there is a bearish mood, when everyone is sure, that “they’ll drop the slurry”? Of course, buyers will be waiting, that tomorrow prices will be even lower, and sellers make their offers cheaper and cheaper in search of the “bottom”.
By chance, whether, The Federal Reserve has opened a nearly one-and-a-half-trillion-dollar line of credit against... 0,25% per annum “to fight against the crisis”, and traders are already making forecasts about “oil 5 dollars per barrel "? breakwater, our financial strength is incalculable, we can print as many dollars as needed, compensate any losses to the Saudis and their shale producers, pay extra to customers, and sellers, pay for the embargo even to Iran, at least Russian, at least any other oil, ruin any of your businesses and buy everything...
Generally, This is no longer a market or trade - this is war. If in everyday life a person behaves like this, How do Americans behave on the world stage?, then his social rights are instantly canceled: subject or handed over to the police, or shoot, or simply “hit you in the face”, - use the entire arsenal of “smoking” means available in the current situation (if anyone has forgotten, This is Carlson To the kid about Miss Bok, and the famous Statue of Liberty - why not Miss Bok, and even with a flammable object in his hand?).
Therefore, various “force majeure” events in the oil industry around the world, including Saudi Arabia proper, now it’s not that it can’t be ruled out, - they are actually programmed. Тем более что американской «сланцевой индустрии» тоже не нужна «бесплатная» нефть — если только эту отрасль не планируется в ближайшее время тем или иным образом национализировать.
But cheap or even “free” oil is very necessary for its net importers, primarily to China, которому предстоит экономически наверстывать утраченное во время борьбы с коронавирусной инфекцией.
Как продать слона, раздутого из мухи?
I won’t go into detail here about the specific payment schemes for exported oil - I’ll just say, that money most often arrives in the accounts of Russian companies-sellers several months after the physical closing of the transaction.
I won’t remind you of that either, that there are simply no “free” oil tankers in the world to supply an additional 3–5 million tons of Saudi oil, due to which freight prices have already increased, According to various sources, at 8 time, and this is far from the limit (хотя все равно копейки для нефтяной индустрии).
Не буду также указывать на то, that a change of supplier means the need to reconfigure the entire oil refining process cycle for a new grade of black gold.
Не буду задаваться фундаментальным вопросом о том, why, если долларов так много, то на энергоносители, including oil, there are fewer of them, а мир постепенно уходит из «нефтедоллара» к другим способам оплаты.
Не буду делать прогнозы насчет того, насколько долго может продлиться нынешнее «нефтяное безумие».
Поэтому только одно, последнее — по месту, но не по значению — замечание. Речь в Telegram-вбросе (the, что это — именно «вброс», I think, уже абсолютно ясно из приведенных выше цифр) идет о суммарной партии в 200 тысяч тонн нефти, что составляет меньше 0,1% ежегодного объема российского экспорта.
Once again - less than a thousandth! And this is not at all that “drop of water”, which reflects the entire ocean of global and Russian oil trade. This is how they make a molehill out of a molehill - so that they can then “sell” it at the price of a real “whale fighter”.
So stop panicking: Russian oil, supplied under long-term contracts, продолжит и дальше приносить миллиарды в бюджет России.
Author: Александр Маслов
