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Gold/Mining/Energy : Strictly: Drilling and oil-field services -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: The Ox who wrote (71901)	8/29/2000 7:44:37 AM
From: jim_p	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 95453

By Reuters LONDON (Reuters) - Oil prices took flight again on Tuesday, adding another dollar a barrel to a runaway market as fears mounted of winter supply shortages in the West. Dealers took fright at the latest comments from OPEC, whose president, Ali Rodriguez of Venezuela, blamed high taxation among consumer nations and refinery bottlenecks for soaring prices. He told reporters on Monday that OPEC's supply of crude was adequate and that the cartel could not be held responsible for current oil price movements. ``There is no problem with crude supply. Prices do not depend exclusively on OPEC,'' Rodriguez said. London Brent blend futures, closed on Monday, were expected to open $1 higher from Friday's $30.39 a barrel settlement after U.S. light crude gained 84 cents on Monday to $32.87. Rodriguez' comments struck a chord with petroleum products dealers on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Eyeing extremely low refined product inventory levels, they sent heating oil futures soaring above a dollar a gallon, a price not seen since October 1990 as Iraqi forces occupied Kuwait during the Gulf crisis. U.S. inventories of heating oil are far below 1999 levels. And those 1999 levels were sparse enough to force federal subsidies for some poor families in the U.S. Northeast as they reeled from high heating oil costs. ``Heating oil inventories are a far cry from what they should be at this time of year and (traders) don't think we're going to catch up in time for winter,'' said Tom Bentz of Paribas Futures in New York. Nationwide, heating oil stocks are down 39 percent from this time a year ago. In the U.S. Northeast, the largest heating oil market in the world, stocks are down to about 20 million barrels compared with about 45 million barrels a year ago, according to the American Petroleum Institute. The Clinton administration is calling on OPEC to raise supply and help lower prices, which are settling inflation nerves jangling in an election year. OPEC meets on Sept. 10 and is expected to increase supply quotas by at least 500,000 barrels a day (bpd). But traders warn that more may be needed to avert supply problems this winter. OPEC has an informal mechanism allowing for a 500,000 bpd increase if the price of a basket of seven crudes stays above a $22-$28 band for 20 working days. It has been above the range for 11 straight days up to Monday and the 20th working day will coincide with OPEC's Sept. 10 conference.