The European Union is inching closer to a historic decision on using profits from Russian assets frozen by the bloc to help Ukraine. The Russian central bank's assets were frozen shortly after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and have remained so ever since. The securities and cash frozen in the G7, the EU, and Australia are estimated to be worth roughly 260 billion euros ($282 billion). Assets worth an estimated 210 billion euros are in the EU, mostly in Belgium, the home of Euroclear, a user-owned financial services company…

The scaling back of the megacity project is attributed to budget constraints, with the Public Investment Fund's cash reserves dropping to $15bn in September 2023.Saudi Arabia has scaled back some of its ambitions for its desert megacity Neom, according to a report by Bloomberg. The $1.5 trillion megacity project, which organizers claim will be 33 times the size of New York City, is due to include a 170km straight-line city. When launching The Line in 2021, the Saudi government had announced that 1.5 million people would be living in the city by…

Via Metal Miner Liberty Steel recently announced a restructuring plan for its operations in the United Kingdom after signing a new framework agreement with creditors. Among other things, the ambitious plan includes hiking crude steel manufacturing capacity at its Rotherham plant. The London-based company noted that the plan would see Liberty consolidate all its operations in the UK into one organization under a new entity and corporate structure. “It is proposed that the existing companies will transfer their assets and employees to the new…

Iran could close the major oil shipping route known as the Strait of Hormuz if necessary, the commander of Iran's Revolution Guard's navy said on Tuesday. But for now, it will keep it open, he added. The warning came following Israel's presence in the United Arab Emirates, which Alirez Tangsiri says he sees as a threat, and Israel's airstrikes on Iran's consulate in Syria earlier this month. "We do not get hit without striking back, but we are also not hasty in our retaliation," Tangsiri said. Iran's historical relationship with the strategic waterway,…

Iran could close the major oil shipping route known as the Strait of Hormuz if necessary, the commander of Iran's Revolution Guard's navy said on Tuesday. But for now, it will keep it open, he added. The warning came following Israel's presence in the United Arab Emirates, which Alirez Tangsiri says he sees as a threat, and Israel's airstrikes on Iran's consulate in Syria earlier this month. "We do not get hit without striking back, but we are also not hasty in our retaliation," Tangsiri said. Iran's historical relationship with the strategic waterway,…

The European Union and United States are incentivizing Armenia to maintain its westward geopolitical shift. The growing EU-US role in supporting the country’s reform efforts is drawing a predictably hostile reaction from Russia and Azerbaijan. A meeting April 5 in Brussels involving Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, European Commission President Ursula von Der Leyen, EU Vice President Josep Borrell and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yielded a significant assistance windfall for Armenia. The EU pledged 270 million euros (about…

Big Oil is trumping the Magnificent Seven on the stock market this year in an oil stocks rally that few had expected a few months ago.   Energy stocks have outperformed the top tech stocks this year as the market has grown more bullish on oil and crude prices rallied at the end of the first quarter and at the start of the second quarter. How long and how high the so-far quiet rally will go will depend on the oil price trajectory this year.   In recent weeks, analysts have started to raise earnings projections for Big Oil's performance…

China’s seaborne coal imports jumped by 17% in the first quarter compared to the same period of 2023, despite earlier expectations that overall coal imports this year would be largely flat versus last year. Imports of all varieties of coal by sea into China stood at 97.43 million metric tons between January and March 2024, an increase of 16.9% from the 83.36 million tons imported in the same quarter last year, data compiled by commodity analysts Kpler and cited by Reuters columnist Clyde Russell showed on Tuesday.   The estimated…

China’s seaborne coal imports jumped by 17% in the first quarter compared to the same period of 2023, despite earlier expectations that overall coal imports this year would be largely flat versus last year. Imports of all varieties of coal by sea into China stood at 97.43 million metric tons between January and March 2024, an increase of 16.9% from the 83.36 million tons imported in the same quarter last year, data compiled by commodity analysts Kpler and cited by Reuters columnist Clyde Russell showed on Tuesday.   The estimated…

China’s seaborne coal imports jumped by 17% in the first quarter compared to the same period of 2023, despite earlier expectations that overall coal imports this year would be largely flat versus last year. Imports of all varieties of coal by sea into China stood at 97.43 million metric tons between January and March 2024, an increase of 16.9% from the 83.36 million tons imported in the same quarter last year, data compiled by commodity analysts Kpler and cited by Reuters columnist Clyde Russell showed on Tuesday.   The estimated…

The chief economist at commodity trading giant Trafigura has warned the copper market could tighten further as a result of artificial intelligence. Speaking at the Financial Times Commodities Summit in Switzerland, Trafigura’s chief economist Saad Rahim said that growth has “suddenly exploded” as a result of the proliferation of global data centres. By 2030, this could amount to an additional 1m tons of need, Rahim said and that the figure is “on top of a 4-5m ton deficit gap by 2030 anyway”. He added: “That’s…

India has raised the share of coal in its power generation this month as sharply lower hydropower output is threatening blackouts as summer approaches. The share of coal in India’s power generation jumped to 77% in the first week of April, rising by around 2 percentage points compared to the same period of 2023, per data from the Grid Controller of India cited by Bloomberg. The higher coal use in the country has been compensating for much lower power generation from hydro resources as India braces for the summer months and the general…

India has raised the share of coal in its power generation this month as sharply lower hydropower output is threatening blackouts as summer approaches. The share of coal in India’s power generation jumped to 77% in the first week of April, rising by around 2 percentage points compared to the same period of 2023, per data from the Grid Controller of India cited by Bloomberg. The higher coal use in the country has been compensating for much lower power generation from hydro resources as India braces for the summer months and the general…

Morgan Stanley sees heightened geopolitical risk pushing Brent Crude oil prices to $94 per barrel in the third quarter as the bank lifted its price forecast by $4 a barrel from its previous projection. “That the degree of geopolitical risk in key oil producing regions has increased recently seems clear and uncontroversial,” Morgan Stanley analysts wrote in a note cited by Reuters. Last month, the bank had already hiked its third-quarter oil price forecast by $10 per barrel, to $90, on the back of expected tighter markets in…

U.S. supermajor Chevron has quit operations in Myanmar by transferring its stake in a natural gas field and an associated pipeline to its former partners in the ventures, after pledging to leave the Southeast Asian country following a military coup in 2021.     “The withdrawal gives effect to our intention to exit Myanmar in a controlled and orderly manner, following the February 2021 coup, and ongoing humanitarian crisis,” a spokesperson for Chevron has told Reuters. Chevron pledged in 2022 to exit Myanmar. In February…

U.S. supermajor Chevron has quit operations in Myanmar by transferring its stake in a natural gas field and an associated pipeline to its former partners in the ventures, after pledging to leave the Southeast Asian country following a military coup in 2021.     “The withdrawal gives effect to our intention to exit Myanmar in a controlled and orderly manner, following the February 2021 coup, and ongoing humanitarian crisis,” a spokesperson for Chevron has told Reuters. Chevron pledged in 2022 to exit Myanmar. In February…

Oil prices are set to trade in the range between $80 and $100 per barrel this year, Russell Hardy, chief executive at the world’s largest independent oil trader, Vitol Group, said at an industry conference on Tuesday. Vitol also expects robust global oil demand growth in 2024, at around 1.9 million barrels per day (bpd) higher than in 2023, Hardy told the audience at the FT Commodities Global Summit in Lausanne, Switzerland.   Oil prices jumped to above $90 per barrel last week—their highest level so far this year…

As bullish sentiment continues to build and Brent settles comfortably above the $90 mark, oil prices look set to continue to climb this week.- German industrial production finally broke through the cycle of gloom after it posted a 2.1% increase in February, well above the consensus expectation of a 0.5% rise month-over-month.- Although Germany’s manufacturing is still below its pre-pandemic levels, the surprise hike in activity fuelled this week’s copper rally and reinforced the expectation of the ECB cutting rates from June onwards.-…

Historically, different market sectors and investments have responded differently as the economy moves from one stage of the business cycle to the next. Understanding how various  financial assets have historically performed at various points in the business cycle can help investors identify opportunities and risks and adjust their portfolios accordingly.  Shifts from one phase of the business cycle to the next have historically taken place every few months or years on average. With the global monetary tightening cycle almost over, many…

Brazilian oil and gas company Enauta may soon change the face of Latin American fossil fuels by establishing an independent oil and gas company with 3R Petroleum Óleo e Gás. This is the most recent of several ambitious moves by Enauta to expand its oil and gas operations in Brazil. In recent months, the firm has signed several contracts to acquire stakes in multiple offshore oilfields in the region, thereby boosting its production capacity. The proposal to merge with 3R, if accepted, could lead to the establishment of a major new…