Analyst Says Market Too Optimistic About Demand

Oil market participants may have focused too much on the surging U.S. fuel demand with states re-opening, possibly ignoring the still lurking COVID threats to demand elsewhere, energy analyst Vandana Hari, founder and chief executive officer of Vanda Insights, told  CNBC in a recent interview.  

The market may be getting ahead of itself because it’s too focused on the bullish demand news out of the United States, according to the analyst.

The demand rebound in America “has also set expectations on a slightly different, more optimistic path,” Hari told CNBC.

“It may be too optimistic, but that’s what the market is factoring in,” she added.

According to the analyst, oil prices would likely remain in the $70-75 a barrel range in the summer. That’s less bullish than the calls of investment banks, including Goldman Sachs, which sees $80 oil this summer amid quickly recovering oil demand.

Expectations that strong demand recovery would outpace supply in coming months could lead to oil prices briefly hitting $100 per barrel in 2022, BofA Global Research said last month.

The bullish sentiment on the market in recent weeks has also resulted in the world’s largest commodity traders not ruling out the possibility of $100 oil. Most of the top executives see oil prices “higher from here” for the rest of the year, although Vitol’s CEO Russell Hardy, warned the overenthusiastic bulls that “we’re in a slightly artificial market at the moment,” when saying that $100 per barrel oil is “of course a possibility.”

Predictions of $100 oil seem to be more common for the coming years, rather than this year, due to an expected supply deficit, especially around 2025, amid low investments in new supply and still growing global oil demand. 

“If you’re cutting supply without at the same time addressing your demand that is when you can get price dislocations,” Glencore’s Head of Oil Marketing, Alex Sanna, told the FT Commodities Global Summit last month, adding that $100 oil was now looking more likely than before. 

“You’re really only one or two events away from a material spike in oil prices,” Sanna said.