Hungary won’t accept any outside pressure on its energy supply policy and will continue to rely on Russia for oil and gas imports, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said on Wednesday, while attending an energy forum in Moscow.    “We have never been let down (by Russia). The deliveries have always arrived... Contracts were always respected. And my question is only why we should cut this relationship,” Szijjarto said, as carried by Reuters. Hungary has continuously clashed with its fellow EU member states…

Hungary won’t accept any outside pressure on its energy supply policy and will continue to rely on Russia for oil and gas imports, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said on Wednesday, while attending an energy forum in Moscow.    “We have never been let down (by Russia). The deliveries have always arrived... Contracts were always respected. And my question is only why we should cut this relationship,” Szijjarto said, as carried by Reuters. Hungary has continuously clashed with its fellow EU member states…

In a move with major implications for the global automotive industry, the U.S. federal government has implemented a 15% import tariff on auto imports from the European Union. According to a federal register notice from September 24, the move affects cars as well as auto parts. That notice went on to indicate that the duties are also retroactive to August 1. The Move Follows a Protracted Negotiation The new tariff follows an August 21 announcement by the United States and the EU regarding a “Framework for an Agreement on Reciprocal, Fair and…

The Norwegian government on Wednesday proposed to raise the spending from the country’s oil fund, the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund, in next year’s budget, according to the draft budget of the Labor party, which won a second term in office at the general elections last month.  The Labor government of Jonas Gahr Støre will need support from its junior partners in the coalition to pass the bill in Parliament.  The 2026 budget proposes to use $57.4 billion (579 billion Norwegian crowns) from the Government…

The world needs more investment in oil and gas as they will continue to account for a large part of the global energy mix in 2050, OPEC Secretary General Haitham Al Ghais said on Wednesday, reiterating the cartel’s view that investment in new supply will be needed in the foreseeable future.  Primary energy demand will jump by 23% by 2050, Al Ghais said in remarks to the Russian Energy Week conference in Moscow, as carried by Reuters. And oil will still represent 30% of total global energy consumption in 2050, OPEC’s Secretary General…

Despite the $10 per barrel decline in oil prices, TotalEnergies expects its earnings and cash flow to have increased in the third quarter from a year earlier, on the back of higher oil and gas production and an annual surge in refining margins.   TotalEnergies expects its oil and gas production for the third quarter 2025 at 2.5 million barrels of oil equivalent per day (boe/d), up by 4% year-on-year, the French supermajor said in a trading update on Wednesday, ahead of the full Q3 results to be published on October 30.  The output…

Despite the $10 per barrel decline in oil prices, TotalEnergies expects its earnings and cash flow to have increased in the third quarter from a year earlier, on the back of higher oil and gas production and an annual surge in refining margins.   TotalEnergies expects its oil and gas production for the third quarter 2025 at 2.5 million barrels of oil equivalent per day (boe/d), up by 4% year-on-year, the French supermajor said in a trading update on Wednesday, ahead of the full Q3 results to be published on October 30.  The output…

Despite ongoing international sanctions and the recent bombing campaign against it by Israel and the U.S., Iran is continuing its push the record levels of oil production it reached in 2024. According to official data and industry sources, last year saw the Islamic Republic produce around 4.3 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil, plus a further 725,000 bpd of other liquids, which marked a post-1979 Iranian Revolutionary record. Understandably, production slumped slightly in the aftermath of the heightened military activity between Tehran,…

Over the past couple of years, the global offshore wind sector has been facing growing pains, with supply chain constraints, policy volatility, and economic headwinds threatening a power segment that has been slated to become the most dominant wind energy source in many regions. These challenges are increasingly forcing companies in the space to abandon projects and undergo strategic restructuring as the momentum for offshore wind and other nascent clean energy industries, such as hydrogen, wanes. To wit, last year, Shell Plc (NYSE:SHEL) announced…

The UK and Norway, two neighboring jurisdictions in the North Sea, have chosen starkly different paths to handle their oil and gas resources. The net-zero-obsessed UK is driving investors away with regulatory and tax uncertainty, while Norway – also aiming for net zero – backs further exploration and cashes in on the massive royalties. The result of the different approaches to the North Sea’s oil and gas has become glaringly evident this decade. The UK imports growing volumes of oil and gas as its mature fields are depleting and…

The rapid rise of artificial intelligence is placing unprecedented strain on global energy sources and grid infrastructure. In response to runaway projected growth trends, public and private investors are fast-tracking new data center projects at a massive scale. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), global investment in data centers reached half a trillion dollars in 2024, representing a nearly two-fold increase over the course of two years. But this rate data center addition has produced a new problem, as their construction is currently…

Sales of electric vehicles in the United States hit an all-time high in the third quarter. Normally a welcome piece of news for EV makers, the record was prompted by the end of tax incentives for EV buyers, which expired at the end of September. From now on, it’s likely to be bad news for car companies with EV plans. Kelley Blue Book reported sales of electric cars in the quarter to September shot up by 40.7% on the previous quarter and by 29.6% on the year. This trend pushed the average car price for the third quarter of the year to over…

The record gold rally of the past few months “may have peaked in trendiness”, a top investment bank has predicted despite the precious metal hitting fresh highs on Monday fuelled by Donald Trump’s threat last week to upend trade with China. Deutsche Bank said that while it was not predicting “an impending correction”, the length and intensity of the yellow metal’s upturn has made a “period of more neutral behaviour” more likely. “The gold rally of September-October may have peaked in trendiness,”…

Egypt is rolling the dice on black gold once again, announcing plans to drill 480 new exploratory oil wells over the next five years—an ambitious $5.7 billion wager that the country can claw its way back from years of production decline. The Petroleum Ministry laid out the plan this week, revealing that 101 wells are already slated for 2026, spread across Egypt’s main producing regions. The announcement didn’t specify where all that capital is coming from—never a minor detail—but the country has been cozying up to…

Egypt is rolling the dice on black gold once again, announcing plans to drill 480 new exploratory oil wells over the next five years—an ambitious $5.7 billion wager that the country can claw its way back from years of production decline. The Petroleum Ministry laid out the plan this week, revealing that 101 wells are already slated for 2026, spread across Egypt’s main producing regions. The announcement didn’t specify where all that capital is coming from—never a minor detail—but the country has been cozying up to…

The Uzbek government is allocating $100 million to turbocharge the development of the country’s AI sector.  A large chunk of the government funding is intended for initiatives to attract foreign investors to construct data centers in Karakalpakstan, an autonomous region in western Uzbekistan, Digital Technologies Minister Sherzod Shermatov said in an interview with state television.  Funding will also be used to develop AI training programs, as well as implement a “package of 86 projects” covering a variety of economic…

Oil may be having a rough week, but Occidental Petroleum’s Vicki Hollub isn’t panicking. The CEO told the Energy Intelligence Forum in London that crude prices are likely to hover in a narrow $58–$62 range through 2026, before breaking higher later in the decade. That call looks almost clairvoyant at the moment: WTI is trading at $58.76, Brent at $62.43, all deep in the red after Monday and Tuesday’s selloff. Hollub said she remains “very bullish on oil prices — not this year or next, but I’m bullish on…

Oil may be having a rough week, but Occidental Petroleum’s Vicki Hollub isn’t panicking. The CEO told the Energy Intelligence Forum in London that crude prices are likely to hover in a narrow $58–$62 range through 2026, before breaking higher later in the decade. That call looks almost clairvoyant at the moment: WTI is trading at $58.76, Brent at $62.43, all deep in the red after Monday and Tuesday’s selloff. Hollub said she remains “very bullish on oil prices — not this year or next, but I’m bullish on…

An oil surplus long prophesied by traders may finally be materializing, according to Gunvor Group CEO Torbjörn Törnqvist, who says the market is shifting from tightness to glut—though not everyone is buying the narrative just yet. “It looks like we are now moving into a bit of a different market,” Törnqvist told Bloomberg in London. “We have heard it before and people have been burned on that. But this time around at this stage I think there’s a bit more substance in the oversupplied narrative.”…

The Copper Monthly Metals Index (MMI) broke above range, with a 3.7% rise from September to October. This comes as copper prices, along with many other metals, continue to show an upside bias. Copper Joins Other Base Metals in Upward Trend Comex copper prices hit a two-month high, barreling past the 11k per metric ton mark by early October. LME copper prices lagged behind their Comex counterparts, but traveled upwards in tandem nonetheless. As of October 10, Comex and LME prices had bounced 17% and 12% from where they stood at the start of August.…