The soon-to-be-M1 Aug’25 Brent futures contract climbed from around $63.00/bbl at 08:10 BST this morning to $63.75/bbl at 10:05 BST, where it initially met resistance but ultimately retraced to $63.77/bbl at 11:20 BST (time of writing). Meanwhile, the Jul’25 Brent futures contract, which expires today, climbed to $64.56/bbl at 10:00 BST but has since softened to $64.50/bbl. An appeals court has granted a bid from the White House to temporarily suspend a trade ruling which stated that President Trump had overstepped his power by imposing global tariffs. Moreover, adding to the trade tensions between the US and China, Washington has ordered a broad list of companies to stop shipping goods, including ethane and butane, to China without a license. The US has also revoked existing licenses granted to some suppliers. Chinese purchases of US ethane hit a record of 492kb/d in 2024 (nearly half of US exports), as per the US EIA. Moreover, Kpler data shows that at least two VLGCs were waiting at US ports to load ethane this week, while 15 more were headed to the USGC to load 284kb/d of ethane in June. In broader macroeconomic news, a Reuters poll showed that China’s factory activity likely contracted for a second month in May, albeit with the forecast for the official PMI at 49.5, higher than April’25 49.0. Finally, at the time of writing, the Jul/Aug’25 and Jul/Jan’25 Brent futures spreads stand at $0.70/bbl and $1.95/bbl, respectively.
