Political premium provides temporary support for gold and oil

Political premium provides temporary support for gold and oil

Oil and gold prices have risen 2.2% and 0.85%, respectively, in the past three days as a result of developments in Saudi Arabia and Donald Trump’s meeting in Asia. Unless geopolitical risks remain elevated, we expect the prices of both commodities to ease. Political premium provides temporary support for gold and oil

The Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, in his drive to modernise the Saudi economy, has taken aim at corruption in the country. With many of the economic and political elite having been caught up in the investigation, there is a risk that the fragile consensus that held the Saudi state together for many decades could unravel.

Saudi Arabia has accused Iran of committing acts of war for supplying the missile that Yemen used in an attempted attack on Saudi Arabia’s airport over the weekend. Saudi Arabia initiated a military intervention in Yemen in 2015 that has been seen as a ‘proxy war’ with Iran given the latter country’s support for rebel Houthis that had toppled Yemen’s former government. On Monday Saudi Arabia also labelled the acts of aggression by the Iran-backed Lebanese Shi’ite group Hezbollah as a declaration of war. These accusations of acts of war have increased the discord in the region, in what some people believe will be the precursor to an actual war between two leading oil producing countries.

Internal and external conflicts in Saudi Arabia

The market perceives both the internal and external conflicts in Saudi Arabia as a source of disruption in oil production. Indeed even if there is no physical disruption to production in the immediate future, the deterrent to international investors providing the capital needed to expand production, could also tighten supplies in the distant future.

Gold has also risen in the wake of increasing geopolitical tension in the Middle East. In addition, US President Trump’s comments during his trip to Asia has stoked concerns about a military confrontation with North Korea. The sabre-rattling that looked like it had calmed down over the past month is resurging. President Trump is expected to place pressure on President Xi in his visit to China today to cut ties with the rogue nuclear state.

We believe that the geopolitical premium priced into gold and oil is likely to be transient unless a war actually breaks out. Based on experiences over the past year, unless risks are crystallised, the geopolitical premium will fade away. On numerous occasions in the past year, sabre-rattling between the US and North Korea has become heated and then calmed down (but the underlying risk of a miscalculation between the two nuclear states has never diminished). The Saudi proxy war with Iran has been raging for over two years, with little reflection in the price of oil until recently. Unless investors are constantly reminded of the risks, the premia tends to evaporate within a matter of weeks.

Nitesh Shah, Research Analyst at ETF Securities

Nitesh is a Commodities Strategist at ETF Securities. Nitesh has 13 years of experience as an economist and strategist, covering a wide range of markets and asset classes. Prior to joining ETF Securities, Nitesh was an economist covering the European structured finance markets at Moody’s Investors Service and was a member of Moody’s global macroeconomics team. Before that he was an economist at the Pension Protection Fund and an equity strategist at Decision Economics. He started his career at HSBC Investment Bank. Nitesh holds a Bachelor of Science in Economics from the London School of Economics and a Master of Arts in International Economics and Finance from Brandeis University (USA).

Proposed OPEC cuts to have little effect

Proposed OPEC cuts to have little effect

OPEC members reached an understanding that a production cut is required at its meeting in Algiers yesterday. That is not yet a commitment to cut production and the cartel is likely to wait until its formal meeting in Vienna on November 30th to thrash out the details. A press release on the group’s website says it will target between 32.5 to 33 million barrels per day of production, down from 33.2 million barrels of production in August. Proposed OPEC cuts to have little effect.

The market has cheered the news with more than a 5% increase in Brent on 28th September. However, we caution that the group has to figure out a method of apportioning the cut. The Conference decided to set up a High Level Committee to study the implementation of the production levels of individual Member countries. If formalised, this is the first time the group will assign a quota in close to two years. While the group traditionally (pre-November 2014) had an aggregate target, it had never made individual country targets. Historically, Saudi Arabia was willing to take the burden of supply cuts. But with Iran trying to pump oil at a break-neck pace, Saudi Arabia is less willing to assume this role. Any deal made in November is likely to hinge on the burden being shared across most members (although countries suffering from outages such as Venezuela and Nigeria may be exempt). We believe it will be difficult to get Iran to participate in production cuts which could damage the chances of a deal being made in November.

Lastly OPEC is aware that their efforts to stabilse the market may be thwarted by non-OPEC countries efforts to gain market share. Saudi Arabia and Russia have already had discussions on the sidelines of the G20 meeting in China about market stabilisation. It appears that Russia will be willing to participate in this effort, but to what degree is unknown. The Committee seeks to develop a framework of consultations between OPEC and non-OPEC countries before the November OPEC conference.

Capping OPEC production at 33 million barrels in of itself will do little to achieve market balance. We continue to believe that the bulk of the heavy lifting to achieve global market balance will be made by non-OPEC countries cutting supply. US$1trn of capex cuts have been planned in the oil and gas industry which will bite into supply. Additionally, weak prices should support the growth of demand.

We believe that crude will continue to trade in a range of US$40-55/bbl, with nimble tight oil producers in the US playing an influential role in setting the top and bottom of this range.

Nitesh Shah, Research Analyst at ETF Securities

Nitesh is a Commodities Strategist at ETF Securities. Nitesh has 13 years of experience as an economist and strategist, covering a wide range of markets and asset classes. Prior to joining ETF Securities, Nitesh was an economist covering the European structured finance markets at Moody’s Investors Service and was a member of Moody’s global macroeconomics team. Before that he was an economist at the Pension Protection Fund and an equity strategist at Decision Economics. He started his career at HSBC Investment Bank. Nitesh holds a Bachelor of Science in Economics from the London School of Economics and a Master of Arts in International Economics and Finance from Brandeis University (USA).