00:00I know you keep a very close tab of geopolitical developments in the Middle East. So I'd love to hear your insight your perspectives on what we got yesterday and whether you actually think this is a watershed moment.
00:13Thank you. Thank you. It's such a pleasure to be with you. I'm sorry. You're in London. But another one of my favorite cities. I think this we'll see whether this is a watershed moment for Palestine for the oil.
00:28Mark and I hope that it is. I think it's still a tall order. Right. A lot of asks for and a lot of asks for the oil markets. I think it's less of an event.
00:43I think the oil markets are really watching what's happening with snapback on Iran which was formally came into effect on Friday. That's likely not going to move markets much in the short term and still really
00:56watching what happens in the other big conflict with Russia and Ukraine. So I think those are where markets are looking. And then you have OPEC plus
01:06saying we'll continue to add. So I think all of this ends with with a bit of a bearish well-supplied market tilt right now in the markets. And
01:17that's why people are putting money into gold and some other commodities rather than oil. Yeah. Let me ask you about the price action oil though the last couple of
01:26days. I mean we're down you know two three percent. We were trading close to 70 on Friday but have pulled back. Do you see that as
01:37anticipation into the OPEC plus supply decision this weekend or do you see it as the market unwinding some of the geopolitical risk premium. What do you think is going
01:46on. Yeah I think where we are now is sort of where we were the middle of last week right. We've gone back to this sort of upper mid 60s
01:56trading range that we've been in for for quite some time. And I think we'll probably stay. The fact that we've had OPEC plus signaling that
02:08they might continue to unwind cuts. Now this is a new phase of cut unwinding but involving the same countries that have been
02:16unwinding these cuts. And so I think it still looks supplied. The big thing I'm watching there. I think the market is struggling to
02:26process is how strong Chinese demand will be. The big story out of the big the meetings in Singapore was that China was stockpiling. Chinese final demand
02:38looked a little soft. And so I think there's also still some questions as we get towards the fall as we get towards the new year.
02:46When demand is a little bit softer will China keep stockpiling. And if oil prices move up above this trading range we might see China pull
02:57back a little bit in this way. So far they're still buying discounted oil wherever they can find it. And they're also tying up tankers in
03:07floating storage. And so that's. Yeah. So watching. So let me ask you about that discounted oil because President Trump's tone and
03:16rhetoric towards Russia has hardened significantly in the last couple of weeks. We saw that at the U.N. General Assembly last week. And
03:24you know we know that he's applying those extra tariffs on India as sort of a punishment for continuing to buy Russian oil. Do you see the U.S.
03:34administration toughening up you know their their stance on Russian production and Russian supplies on countries that continue to buy
03:43Russian oil. And do you see it having a meaningful impact ultimately on the amount of oil that's available.
03:48My base case is that it won't be meaningful. Trump and and his team are talking tough. We're also seeing the Europeans do some
04:00different steps to try to reduce their own purchases particularly of natural gas though they're waiting till 2027.
04:08We're ultimately I think though the fact that the Trump administration couched their willingness to be tougher on whether the
04:17Europeans join them in putting secondary sanctions on China and India makes me think this threat is a bit less credible. And we also have to
04:27weigh this against the fact that Trump wants oil to remain cheap and believes that cheaper oil would actually push Russia out of the war effort.
04:38even more so than higher oil prices. So I think those two competing trends are going to be present. Now Trump will continue to be tough on
04:48on Iran. I know I shrugged off this the snapback impact in and of itself as the Europeans reimpose sanctions that
04:57in effect haven't been been meaningful for some time. But the U.S. could do more unilateral measures. Now you and Min Min just
05:07talked about the Trump she meeting. I think we have to watch that for the oil markets as well. Reports suggest I think maybe from
05:15your colleagues that China is again buying a few cargoes of U.S. crude oil. If so that would be the first time in about six months since the
05:27sort of April really extensive tariffs. So on the margins you know we could see China going back diversifying a little bit. They're not
05:38buying the large volumes of U.S. oil products and LNG that they were last year. But this might be a bit of a peace offering. So I think we see
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