December 12, 2013 The last Bubble Map of the year shows the Bakken discount has narrowed since we last checked in. On December 9th, Bakken at Clearbrook, MN was posted at $10 under WTI. But the WCS discount has widened to $26. Maya remains at $9 under WTI. The Brent, Louisiana Light Sweet and Alaska...
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October 18, 2013 Well…not really. But the Bakken discount has widened since we last checked in. On October 16, Bakken at Clearbrook, MN was posted at $12 under WTI. LLS was priced $1 over WTI and Brent was $9 over. San Joaquin Valley Heavy has dropped to $5 under WTI. Alaska North Slope was...
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September 9, 2013 Well, the kids are back at school and we’re all back working away. The kids will be asked, “What did you do this summer?” Our kids will be writing about Disneyland, stand-up paddle boarding (coming nose to whiskers with sea lions), and surfing in Southern California. We had a very full summer...
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July 25, 2013 Mexican Maya differential returns to the latest edition of the Bubble Map! The last time Maya appeared on the Bubble Map, way back in April, it was $7 over. We found a new price-reporting source for Maya that show it $5 under WTI on July 24th. Yesterday, Bakken at the wellhead...
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June 17, 2013 The June 14th Bubble Map shows some big changes in the Bakken at Clearbrook price. The differential at Clearbrook has been volatile since we last checked in. It peaked at a $3.50 premium earlier last week, settling at a $2 premium over WTI last Friday. The Bakken differential at the wellhead...
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June 5, 2013 In the June Bubble Map we see some interesting differentials west of the Bubble. The WTI-San Joaquin Valley Heavy differential is the tightest we’ve seen…ever. SJVH is just a $2 premium over WTI, down from $6 in our last post. The WTI-ANS differential has also tightened to $7 over, down from...
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May 14, 2013 We’ve given the Bubble Map a fresh look for spring. It’s a little less busy, but still contains the same great information. Notice the two price differentials for Bakken, one at the wellhead and one at Clearbrook, MN. We thought it would be instructive to show the cost of moving the...
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April 8, 2013 The April edition of the Bubble Map shows that Mid Continent price differentials to the coast have gone down since our last update in January when Brent was $18 over WTI. The WTI/WCS differential is the narrowest since last October. WCS prices generally strengthen in spring because the start of the paving...
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February 15, 2013 When gasoline prices in California shot up to record levels last fall, the public was reasonably frustrated and the media and policy makers were eager to understand the root causes of the spike. Stillwater monitors crude oil and retail gasoline prices daily and we wrote extensively about this price spike on our...
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February 8, 2013 Pacific Rim refineries have the capacity for Canadian heavy crude oil, but the window for opportunity is narrow. Unless crude oil producers in Alberta can find a way to get their product to refiners in the Pacific Rim consistently, those refiners will start looking for heavy crude elsewhere. On Thursday, the University...
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February 5, 2013 The average price for retail gasoline in Los Angeles yesterday was $4.03, 23 cents higher than the price last Monday of $3.77. It’s typical this time of year for retail prices to rise, but this price spike is unique because prices have jumped so high so quickly. There are three factors driving...
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January 8, 2013 We’re back in the New Year with an updated Bubble Map. Crude oil prices have gone up across the board since our last blog post on November 27. Differentials between WTI and most marker crudes have tightened, except for WCS. The WCS discount has deepened since before the holidays to $36 under...
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November 27, 2012 The price of gasoline in California has stabilized, a gallon of regular in Los Angeles today was $3.79, down $0.91 from the height of the spike on October 8th. And now the congressional investigations are heating up. At the California Senate hearing on the price spike held earlier this month, energy consultant...
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November 15, 2012 The Bubble Map is back! Since we last checked in crude oil spot prices have fallen. The price of WTI has dropped $10 since the end of August to $85.45 on November 15th. The price differential between WTI and WCS has doubled to $32 under. Limited pipeline capacity is to blame for...
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October 7, 2012 What happened in the spot market? Spot prices started to move up on refinery problems on 9/27. By Monday, October 1, the spot was up 30 cpg On that Monday, Exxon Mobil’s Torrance refinery lost power due to an equipment failure at Southern California Edison. Spot prices rose to 83 cpg to...
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August 29, 2012 Gulf Coast crude differentials dropped this week due to a surprise bump in crude inventories. The price of WTI is down slightly from last week, closing at $96 on August 28th. The prices of Brent and Louisiana Light Sweet have dropped $3, to $17 and $15 over WTI respectively. While prices in...
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August 8, 2012 Crude oil prices are up considerably since our last blog post. WTI closed at $94 on August 7th, up $6. The spreads between WTI and most coastal crudes remain relatively unchanged. However, the San Joaquin Valley Heavy differential has shrunk to $5 over WTI, down from $9 last week. Discounts in the...
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August 1, 2012 WTI closed at $88 on July 31st, unchanged from our last blog post. The spreads between WTI and Brent, Alaska North Slope and San Joachin Valley Heavy are up. The Brent spread is up $2 from July 16, to $18. Discounts in the Mid Continent have widened again. Bakken’s discount is back...
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July 16, 2012 Since our last blog post, crude oil prices have rebounded. WTI closed at $88 on July 16th, up $4 since we last checked in. LLS and Brent prices have also risen. The spread between LLS and WTI is up $7 from our last post, to $19 on July 16th. The spread...
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June 20, 2012 Crude oil spot prices have remained in about the same place since the last blog post, except for Western Canadian Select and Bakken. WCS has dropped another $2 from June 1, to $22 under WTI. The Canadian Pacific Railway strike, that ended last Friday, may have played a small part in the...
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June 5, 2012 The last time we checked in on the Mid Continent Bubble, the price differentials between WTI and Bakken and WCS had softened. On May 16, Bakken was $2 under the WTI price of $93 per barrel, and WCS was $15 under. Since then the price of crude oil has dropped. WTI sold...
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May 17, 2012 We continue to keep a close eye on the crude oil supply situation in the mid continent. Since the last blog post, the price differentials of marker crudes have shrunk. As you can see from the map, on May 16, WTI was selling at $99 a barrel, down from $103 a barrel...
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April 7, 2012 Oil market observers know that there is a disconnect between the prices of the two benchmark light sweet crude oils, West Texas Intermediate and North Sea Brent. In the past, these oils traded for about the same price. The difference, or spread, between WTI and Brent opened up when more and...
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January 11, 2012 By David Hackett The School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary published “Catching the Brass Ring: Oil Market Diversification Potential for Canada” on December 15, 2011. The paper “…examines the nature and structure of the Canadian oil export market in the context of world prices for heavy crude oil...
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January 3, 2011 By David Hackett Stillwater has been following the LCFS issues from the start and we have concerns about the feasibility of the biofuels program to meet the carbon intensity goals at an affordable price. Our calculations indicate that the regulation will increase motorists’ costs by billions of dollars per year as the...
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By David Hackett An energy analyst friend of mine from the East Coast called and asked me why gasoline prices are so cheap in California. This is a question I have been puzzling over all summer. Of course, most readers are going to say, “What are you talking about? Retail gas prices in LA are...
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August 22, 2012 Crude oil prices are up this week with WTI closing at $97 on August 22nd. The spreads between WTI and most coastal crudes remain relatively unchanged. The price of Bakken remains relatively in line with WTI at $1 under. The WCS discount continues to tighten to $11 under from $14 on August...
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