Crude oil inventories in the United States decreased by 6.1 million barrels during the week ending June 19, according to new data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released on Wednesday. The decrease brings commercial stockpiles to 412.1 million barrels, according to government data, which is now 7% below the five-year average for this time of year. The EIA’s data release follows API’s figures that were released a day earlier, which reported that crude oil inventories saw a draw of 765,000 barrels in the period.…

UK’s slower-than-expected electrification exposes households to fossil fuel price shocks, the country’s Climate Change Committee (CCC) said on Wednesday, urging faster electrification and removal of policy costs to lower the energy bills. While the uptake of electric vehicles (EVs) has accelerated and the latest renewable energy auctions awarded record new capacity, progress in heat pump installations has slowed, the independent panel said in its annual report. The CCC’s annual assessment warned that “households are facing…

UK’s slower-than-expected electrification exposes households to fossil fuel price shocks, the country’s Climate Change Committee (CCC) said on Wednesday, urging faster electrification and removal of policy costs to lower the energy bills. While the uptake of electric vehicles (EVs) has accelerated and the latest renewable energy auctions awarded record new capacity, progress in heat pump installations has slowed, the independent panel said in its annual report. The CCC’s annual assessment warned that “households are facing…

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived in Abu Dhabi on June 23, opening a high-stakes Gulf tour aimed at reassuring Washington’s closest Arab allies after a fragile cease-fire framework between the United States and Iran raised fresh questions over regional security and Tehran’s future ambitions. Rubio landed at Al Bateen Executive Airport before meetings with leaders in the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and Bahrain over the next two days, as Gulf capitals weigh the implications of a US-brokered de-escalation deal with Tehran. The…

The euro has sunk to a one-year low, with easing of tensions between the United States and Iran helping to cool oil prices and raise expectations that the European Central Bank will turn more dovish. The euro was quoted at $1.135 against the U.S. dollar on Wednesday, down from $1.165 before the U.S. and Iran first agreed to a conditional ceasefire on 8th April. A provisional peace agreement to restore oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz has dramatically cooled global energy markets, with Brent crude for August delivery trading at $74.76 per…

The euro has sunk to a one-year low, with easing of tensions between the United States and Iran helping to cool oil prices and raise expectations that the European Central Bank will turn more dovish. The euro was quoted at $1.135 against the U.S. dollar on Wednesday, down from $1.165 before the U.S. and Iran first agreed to a conditional ceasefire on 8th April. A provisional peace agreement to restore oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz has dramatically cooled global energy markets, with Brent crude for August delivery trading at $74.76 per…

Oil tanker rates have soared since the U.S. and Iran announced the memorandum of understanding as oil importers scramble to charter vessels to pick up Persian Gulf cargoes in the hope these can transit the tentatively reopening Strait of Hormuz.  One tanker has been provisionally booked to ship crude from the Persian Gulf to India at a rate that’s nine times the benchmark for the route, shipbrokers told Bloomberg on Wednesday.   South Korea’s Sinokor shipping group, which before the war went on a buying and chartering…

The biggest investment opportunity of the AI era has very little to do with software or chips. The market has already priced both. The real story is power: who owns it, where it sits and how cheaply it can be delivered to AI workloads at scale. A small data center company that almost no one on Wall Street has heard of just answered all three of those questions in front of the entire industry. In May 2026, Bitzero Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:AIBZ) signed a binding letter for a 15-year lease with OneQode for the entire 110 megawatts at its Namsskogan,…

The closure of the Strait of Hormuz and the stranding of more than 10 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil in the Persian Gulf was a wake-up call for import-dependent countries to expand their capacity to hold strategic and commercial reserves. Many countries, especially in the Asia Pacific, are looking to build new reserve capacity to boost their energy security and never again be caught off-guard by a massive supply disruption like the one triggered by the closure of the most important oil and LNG chokepoint. From India to Australia, energy…

The U.S. federal government will reduce costs for oil and gas drillers by slashing red tape for the industry, aiming to tempt drillers to expand on federal lands. In a news release this week, the Interior Department said it would revise the Bureau of Land Management’s rule for federal land leasing for oil and gas drilling as well as the BLM’s waste prevention rule, by essentially loosening both to reduce the cost burden on energy companies. Under the revised rules, the cleanup cost of an abandoned well will fall from $500,000 to as…

The United States is still the largest producer of nuclear energy in the world – but probably not for long. Decades of political ambivalence have left the domestic nuclear sector in a state of neglect. Far more reactors are aging out than being constructed, and the country’s few attempts at building new nuclear fission reactors have been controversial, expensive, and slow to get off the ground. After Georgia’s Plant Vogtle finally came online years late and billions over budget in 2024, zero new reactors have since come under…

The American Petroleum Institute (API) estimated that crude oil inventories in the United States fell by 765,000 barrels in the week ending June 19. In the week prior, US crude oil inventories fell by 8.33 million barrels. Although commercial crude oil inventories excluding the SPR have been falling rapidly for the last 2+ months, shedding 53 million barrels over the last ten weeks, US crude inventories are only down 2.1 million barrels so far this year, according to API data, kept in check by draws from the SPR. Slowing the inventory bleeding…

When you're drowning in debt, plagued by declining production, and running a refining business that seems chronically allergic to profits, buddying up with a more successful partner starts looking like a sound strategy. That's essentially what just happened between Mexico's Pemex and Brazil's Petrobras. The two state-controlled oil giants signed a memorandum of understanding this week to collaborate on exploration, production, refining, natural gas, petrochemicals, and more. But the headline item? Deepwater exploration in the Gulf of Mexico. Petrobras…

Elon Musk’s SpaceX has begun selling investment grade bonds for the first time in what is anticipated to be a mass borrowing spree in order to fund the company’s ambitious AI plans following its blockbuster Nasdaq listing. Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase & Co and Morgan Stanley are arranging calls with investors in a bid to provide temporary bridge financing for the satellite company, according to reports in Bloomberg. A bond offer is expected to follow this, with maturities ranging between five and 30…

The head of China’s National Energy Administration, Wang Hongzhi, visited Kazakhstan to participate in the inaugural meeting of the Kazakhstan-China Joint Working Group on Cooperation in Civil Nuclear Energy. Participants approved a protocol that defines future cooperation in the nuclear energy sphere, according to a Kazakh government statement, which offered no further details. Kazakhstan has selected China’s National Nuclear Corp. to build two large-scale reactors in the Central Asian nation. Rosatom, Russia’s nuclear agency,…

The Strait of Hormuz may be reopening, but don't tell tanker owners the crisis is over. They're making too much money. As Middle Eastern producers scramble to move crude that has spent months stranded in the Persian Gulf, tanker rates have exploded higher, turning a slow return to normal into a windfall for shipping companies. According to Reuters, the cost of hiring a tanker in the Gulf has nearly doubled in just a week, jumping from around $106,000 per day to more than $190,000 per day. For some very large crude carriers (VLCCs) hauling cargoes…

The Strait of Hormuz may be reopening, but don't tell tanker owners the crisis is over. They're making too much money. As Middle Eastern producers scramble to move crude that has spent months stranded in the Persian Gulf, tanker rates have exploded higher, turning a slow return to normal into a windfall for shipping companies. According to Reuters, the cost of hiring a tanker in the Gulf has nearly doubled in just a week, jumping from around $106,000 per day to more than $190,000 per day. For some very large crude carriers (VLCCs) hauling cargoes…

Rory Green, TS Lombard's chief China economist, is the latest Wall Street strategist to warn of the mounting macro and food inflation risks that a super El Niño could release on certain regions of the world. In a note titled "Super El Niño: Famine Follows War?" Green warns that war-related disruptions to energy and fertilizer markets, compounded by adverse weather conditions, could create a perfect storm for global food prices. Green said, "In general, El Niño raises temperatures and significantly exacerbates both drought and…

Since the replacement of Russia by China as the primary would-be superpower rival to the U.S., Saudi Arabia has sought to balance its relationships with Beijing and Washington -- sometimes leaning more one way, and sometimes the other. Until the 2014-2016 Oil Price War, the U.S. was the core relationship; after the war had finished, it was China and Russia; and then, from the start of U.S. President Donald Trump’s second term in office, it was the U.S. again. However, in the aftermath of Operation Epic Fury against Iran, this looks set to…

Italian gas distributor Italgas plans to invest nearly $15 billion by 2032 as it accelerates the use of AI in increasingly smarter and flexible networks, Europe’s largest natural gas distributor said on Tuesday. Total planned investments under the company’s Strategic Plan 2026-2032 unveiled today will be 13 billion euros, or $14.8 billion, through 2032. This would be a 14.6% increase compared to the previous strategic plan. A total of $9.5 billion (8.3 billion euros) is earmarked for the development, digitization, and repurposing of…