A plethora of physical traders I encountered in Istanbul say they have no problem whatsoever procuring crude oil, especially light sweet crude, at their desirable price points. Even India’s Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, told me his country was importing its first ever consignment of U.S. conventional oil at a very competitive price and that American shale oil imports may yet follow. You cannot understate the geopolitical significance of this development, even if it’s just a solitary consignment of crude oil from the U.S. to a market traditionally reliant on Middle Eastern crude. Simply put, the U.S. is now firmly established as a medium-term buffer producer that the world’s third largest consumer of crude oil thinks it can also turn to. According to Fatih Birol, Executive Director of International Energy Agency (IEA), U.S. shale oil production is on an upward curve.

Source: Forbes July 21, 2017 21:39 UTC