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b'Tankers "sabotaged" in the Persian Gulf
https://www.wsj.com/articles/saudi-oil-tankers-attacked-before-entering-persian-gulf-11557725971
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-oil/oil-prices-up-as-middle-east-tanker-attacks-heighten-supply-concerns-idUSKCN1SJ012
Was this an \\u201con purpose\\u201d accident designed to stir up trouble? Or was it a delicate act of sabotage by Iranians? Al Qaeda? Some people out in little boats joyriding? Could this be Iran testing the waters to see what the U.S. will do with just a tiny bit of provocation? In the end, trade news subsumed everything and oil prices fell.
Check here for more updates:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/ellenrwald/2019/05/13/confusion-over-sabotaged-tankers-in-persian-gulf-roils-oil-prices/

Tesla Raising Money
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/02/business/tesla-stock-fundraising.html
https://www.ccn.com/elon-musk-loads-up-tesla-stock-but-carmakers-worst-enemy-is-tesla-itself-morgan-stanley
The media finally might be coming around to the fact that Tesla\\u2019s got problems. But do the Tesla-lovers? Media and analysts who weren\\u2019t critical deserve blame, not just Elon Musk

And how could we not...
https://www.foxbusiness.com/features/elon-musk-tesla-car-inspired-baby-names-2018
Would you name your child Tesla?

API Monthly Statistical Report, interview with Dr. Dean Foreman
- builds in U.S. inventory? Increase in Iranian oil imports pre-sanctions waiver expiry likely played into this, along with growing U.S. production.
- Jet fuel demand: a lot of planes were grounded and cancelled flights after Boeing 737 Max. Airlines have taken older planes and put them back into service. These planes use more fuel. Demand for travel remaining relatively strong.
- Consumers are voting their pocketbook and continuing to spend money traveling
- April saw strong consumer driven gasoline demand but declining distillate demand from industry. Will this turn into a trend? Seasonality- we are stocking up and changing over to reformulated gasoline for summer. Also embedded in jet fuel issue. Easter fell a bit later and that was a factor in the April numbers.
- China raising tariffs on LNG exports from U.S. from 10% to 25%. Immature market compared to oil market. So much of LNG exports from U.S. go to China. Need to have a trusted trade relationship to underpin multi-billion trade contract.
- U.S. oil exports to Asia very diversified - China is only one destination among many. India is a huge importer. As long as there is global demand, barrels have to come from somewhere. Barrels are essentially interchangeable within quality. LNG isn\\u2019t like that. Market that is growing in large chunks for the first time. Depends on unities investing in infrastructure that they need to use the natural gas.
- LNG industry is looking at several trade offs. Permitting has finally moved forward, and now the financing and contracts are the issue. Sending LNG to Asia is a financial negotiation now. Europe is a good option though - Germany is now looking to diversify off of Russian gas and may look to import American LNG. This is gas on gas competition because they take Russian and African gas and other domestic sources of gas. Demand isn\\u2019t growing rapidly there like it is in Asia.
- Refinery capacity utilization: April was on the low end (only 88%). This time last year, very low averages now sitting at about 1 million bpd in outages. This is more normal and last year was out of the norm. This could also be because refineries can\\u2019t use their Cokers and crackers because they aren\\u2019t getting enough heavy crude due to the sanctions on Venezuela.

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