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Despite Iran's Attacks, Gulf Oil Exports Exceed Prewar Levels (maritime-executive.com)

19 points by gumby 4h ago | 19 comments

A_D_E_P_T 3h ago
> "By Kpler's count, the GCC states are now moving about 24 million barrels per day out of the region, including volumes transported by overland pipeline."

Complete BS article. I guess Kpler is the propaganda mouthpiece.

The article double-counts "Hormuz Shuttle" ship-to-ship (STS) transfers and misreads pipeline capacity.

An example: If 14 mb/d is moving through the Strait of Hormuz, getting to 24 mb/d requires 10 mb/d to move via overland bypass pipelines. In reality, the only two bypass pipelines out of the Gulf have a combined physical ceiling of ~6.5 to 8.5 mb/d. (And that's when they're fully operational, which may not be the case today!)

Many more obvious mistakes in this "analysis." It's totally bunk.

Ajedi32 2h ago
Kpler is a commercial data broker, not a political institution; they have no incentive to lie to their customers. Where are you seeing the article double counting ship transfers? The article doesn't try to do any math, it just cites Kpler. If 8.5Mb is current pipeline capacity, is it possible there could be other overland shipments making up the remaining 1.5Mb?
yorwba 2h ago
In this Kpler blog post https://www.kpler.com/blog/explainer-how-mideast-gulf-crude-... they write "At least 16.5 mbd left the region in September, matching the pre-war average excluding Iran." Maybe Maritime Executive did try to do some math to Kpler's figures instead of just quoting them.
Ajedi32 2h ago
Hmm, yeah maybe they tried to add pipeline exports to that figure without realizing the figure already included pipeline exports? Pretty boneheaded mistake if that's what happened.

Other possibility is that that Kplr article you linked is outdated; it doesn't have a date listed on it so it's hard to tell. The graphs do go up to September though so it can't be that outdated...

gumby 2h ago
I don’t know you figure there’s double counting from that article: the shuttles to Fujairah are transiting the strait.

I’m also dubious about the gross figures but I do think it’s an interesting possibility (if they are correct then there’s an uncharacteristic overshoot in pricing, which seems suspicious). But ppl in the industry seem to take Kpler seriously — I just saw them at Gastech last month.

I can’t find the referenced report (it could be just a subscriber note) but here’s a blog entry on how they count: https://www.kpler.com/blog/explainer-the-nuances-of-reading-...

We need to move the global economy off fossil fuels and and an opex-driven fuel system in general. Fortunately that shift is finally well under way, except in the US.

sorushn 2h ago
It all makes sense when you realize Kpler's head of crude oil analysis is a hardcore Iranian monarchist.
gumby 2h ago
Given the government in power wouldn’t that cause them to skew the reports the other way? Its kore in the Americans’ interest to make this supply claim.

Then again, a hard core monarchist of any stripe is unlikely to be a rational thinker.

sorushn 1h ago
The role of Kpler and the likes of The Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) here is to encourage mounting pressure (and eventually yet another war) on Iran by claiming that things are working out in US's favor, so that the global economic pain does force Trump to change course.
Guid_NewGuid 2h ago
It's interesting, something struck me as off about the analysis. I mean it could well be true but the price of oil and VLCC daily rates suggest it probably isn't.

There's a tonne of articles resharing this Kpler analysis. The closest to corroboration I could find was references to Marisks and Vortexa data.

This Russian site[0] quotes the following:

> Oil flows from Persian Gulf producers excluding Iran rebounded to more than 81% of pre-war levels in September, averaging 19.2m barrels per day against about 23.6m bpd in the year before the regional conflict began on 28 February, according to Vortexa.

But assuming that analysis is paywalled I can't find it anywhere, and the article also relies on the Kpler analysis extensively.

Marisks is just about ship movements so doesn't really add anything to the picture. All that to say, it may well be true but the current story and way it is being propagated seem fishy.

[0]: https://en.portnews.ru/news/397951

m3kw9 2h ago
Looking at the title and just hearing news from the strait and gas prices, it’s obvious they are not saying these barrels reached anywhere in the same amount.
Ajedi32 2h ago
Something's not adding up. Surely demand for oil is not so inflexible as to sustain such greatly increased prices at pre-war levels of supply, right? Has demand for oil increased since the start of the war for some reason? Or is there another factor beyond the Iranian blockade now driving the entirety of the reduction in supply? The Russia-Ukraine war?
Reubachi 3m ago
A caveat to the below: the region is still at war.

Oil demand is inflexable when considering the demand has rarely been based around refilling reserves and pricing hasn't been determined by the insurance houses. Strategic reserves are depleted across the globe, china in particular.

Even with those releases of reserves, economies/markets relying on diesel went into limp mode due to the FUD about war. For many months there was complete uncertainty about who insures the insurers. So, now these economies need to catch up. (not forgetting, the globe is still "at war" and the messaging is up and down.)

Anyways, The first priority to return to pre-war oil economy is to refill those reserves and exit limp mode. Pricing will not go down in a predictable trend until that happens, and even at >pre-war production levels, that will take decades to get back due to the "squeeze" cost.

comrade1234 2h ago
It went from $60,000/day for a tanker to over a $million/day for insurance, danger pay, etc.
jerrythegerbil 3h ago
Exports remain flowing. Imports remain problematic, for certain localities.

It’s going, just not where it was before.

wffurr 3h ago
And it takes a lot of money to pay a crew to risk their ship in the strait.
sleepyguy 3h ago
Yes, so much oil is flowing that strategic reserves are being drained and countries are being forced to release diesel stocks.....
mlinhares 3h ago
Money finds a way.
cpursley 3h ago
Yep. I also like the phrase "money always goes to where it's treated the best"
grim_io 2h ago
I call bullshit until the guy from the "what's going on with shipping" YouTube channel confirms it.