Tuesday, March 21, 2023

Saudi Aramco Posts Blowout Annual Profit and Raises Dividend

 https://cdni.rt.com/files/2019.01/article/5c430454dda4c8865e8b4588.jpg

https://tankterminals.com/news/saudi-aramco-posts-blowout-annual-profit-and-raises-dividend/ 

Saudi Aramco unexpectedly increased its dividend and said it would hike spending as it looks to deploy an avalanche of cash generated by last year’s surge in oil and gas prices.

The world’s biggest energy company made net income for the full year of $161 billion, the most since it listed and up 46% from 2021. Its performance was bolstered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine roiling oil markets and the OPEC+ alliance raising production.

Aramco boosted its dividend — a crucial source of funding for the Saudi Arabian government — to $19.5 billion for the final quarter, up 4% from the previous three-month period.

US and European peers such as Chevron Corp. and Shell Plc also reported blowout earnings and are returning billions of dollars to shareholders through larger dividends and buybacks. Aramco, until now, has instead focused on using its extra cash to increase output.

Crude prices have fallen from $125 a barrel since the middle of 2022, with Brent dropping another 3.6% this year to below $83 a barrel. That’s been caused in large part by the US Federal Reserve staying hawkish on inflation and investors no longer anticipating interest rates will be on a clear downward path by the second half of 2023.

The company’s adjusted profit weakened to around $31 billion between October and December, according to Bloomberg estimates, down from $42 billion in the third quarter. Aramco will release a full financial statement on Monday.

Sabic, a chemicals firm controlled by Aramco, saw income slump in late 2022 as a global economic slowdown weighed on consumption of everything from plastics to building materials.

China bounce

Many traders still think oil will climb later this year, perhaps back to $100 a barrel, as China’s economy recovers with the ending of coronavirus lockdowns.

Demand in China and India, two of Aramco’s main markets, is robust, Chief Executive Officer Amin Nasser said to reporters on Sunday. Oil consumption will probably hit a record of 102 million barrels a day by the end of 2023, he said.

“Europe might have been impacted a little bit because of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and economic headwinds,” he said. “But in the rest of the world, where most of our supplies go to, we are seeing pick up in demand.”

Aramco reiterated there’s too little investment globally in oil and gas production and warned that a tight market could cause prices to jump.

“Given that we anticipate oil and gas will remain essential for the foreseeable future, the risks of underinvestment in our industry are real — including contributing to higher energy prices,” Nasser said in a company statement.

Saudi Arabia has criticized Western governments and energy firms for trying to transition to clean energy too quickly. Aramco, in contrast, is spending billions of dollars to raise its daily oil capacity to 13 million barrels by 2027 from 12 million, and gas output by more than 50% this decade.

Aramco spent $37.6 billion on capital projects in 2022 and will increase the figure to between $45 billion and $55 billion this year, it said. In addition to oil, its investing heavily in cleaner fuels including hydrogen.

The full year dividend of $75.8 billion — the world’s largest for a public company — was easily covered by free cash flow, which soared to almost $149 billion.

“We’re aiming to sustain it at this level and grow it through the years,” Chief Financial Officer Ziad Al-Murshed said of the dividend.

Aramco will also issue one bonus share for every 10 shares owned.

The gearing ratio, a measure of net debt to equity, fell further into negative territory as the firm’s finances improved. It dropped to -7.9% from -4.1% at the end of September.

Crude production averaged 10.5 million barrels a day in 2022, the highest level ever for the kingdom. That came as the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its partners — a 23-nation group led by Saudi Arabia and Russia — opted to pump more following deep supply cuts in 2020 as Covid-19 battered the oil market.

OPEC+ staying put

Saudi Arabia’s energy minister, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, has indicated the alliance will leave its quotas unchanged for at least the rest of the year.

Aramco, based in Dhahran in eastern Saudi Arabia, carried out an initial public offering in 2019. The government still owns around 98% of the stock, which was unchanged on Sunday in Riyadh at 32.80 riyals.

Aramco has a market value of $1.9 trillion, second only to Apple Inc.

Tanker With Russian Oil Sits Off Ghana 2 Weeks After Arrival

Tanker Theseus has been waiting off coast of Ghana since Feb. 24.

Tanker Theseus has been waiting off coast of Ghana since Feb. 24.Source: Bloomberg

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-03-10/tanker-with-russian-oil-sits-off-ghana-two-weeks-after-arriving?leadSource=uverify%20wall 

An oil tanker loaded with Russian crude has been idling off the coast of Ghana for more than two weeks. 

The tanker Theseus reached Ghana’s territorial waters on Feb. 24 and was supposed to discharge its load into storage tanks at the Tema oil refinery, known as TOR. The National Petroleum Authority granted a delivery period for the cargo to be unloaded, but national security considerations have held up the process, according to people familiar with the matter.

Gold price backs off after surpassing $2,000, nearing record high

Gold price

https://www.mining.com/gold-price-backs-off-after-eclipsing-2000-for-first-time-in-a-year/ 

Gold prices backed off from the key $2,000 level on Monday as investors assess the health of the global banking sector, even as increasing bets of a Federal Reserve rate pause kept bullion near a one-year peak.

Earlier, spot gold climbed 1.6% to its highest since March 2022 at $2,009.59 per ounce, just short of a record set during the onset of the pandemic. By noon ET, it reversed to a 0.6% loss at $1,977.42 per ounce.

US gold futures, meanwhile, rose 0.2% to $1,978.00 per ounce in New York.

[Click here for an interactive chart of gold prices]

“Gold’s volatility reflects that the market is digesting the recent shotgun wedding between Credit Suisse and UBS and the possible contagion,” independent analyst Ross Norman told Reuters.

Prices have rallied more than $100 after the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank earlier this month, the second-largest banking crisis in US history, which also ensnared 167-year-old lender Credit Suisse.

Europe’s bank shares fought back from an early slump led by UBS Group’s rescue deal to buy Credit Suisse failed to assuage market fears of a global banking contagion, sending their shares sharply lower.

Bullion touched record highs in some currencies on Monday, and near an all-time peak in US dollars, on the back of the latest banking sector turmoil, which has sent safe-haven demand skyrocketing.

“It’s all about risk hedging,” said StoneX analyst Rhona O’Connell. “A Swiss bank is supposed to be the be all and end all of safe havens,” she said. “If something else happens in the banking sector, you can expect gold to go higher.”

Investors will keenly watch a Fed policy decision due on Wednesday. Traders are now pricing in a 49% chance of the Fed holding rates in the current range, according to Reuters.

Ole Hansen, head of commodity strategy at Saxo Bank, told Bloomberg that the outcome of this week’s Fed meeting is “going to be the most difficult to predict in years.” He added:

“A shift to a more dovish outlook from policymakers at a time when inflation remains hot could push gold even higher.”

“Today’s rejection above $2000 may trigger some profit taking, but in our opinion not a change in direction,” Hansen said in a separate note to Reuters.

“We maintain a bullish outlook for gold, especially if the FOMC, driven by the current banking and liquidity crisis, is forced to change its focus away from fighting inflation to maintaining stability.”

(With files from Bloomberg and Reuters)

Trafigura sees fresh copper price records within a year

Trafigura plans to take large amounts of LME copper

https://www.mining.com/web/trafigura-sees-fresh-copper-price-records-within-a-year/     

The co-head of metals and minerals at the world’s biggest copper trader said on Monday the copper price could hit a new record high within the next 12 months owing to very tight stocks, even above $12,000 a tonne.

“I would highlight copper as the most critical metal globally given the shortage in the market. We only had 3.5 days of copper stock equivalent at the end of last year,” Trafigura’s Kostas Bintas told the FT Commodities Global Summit.

Copper hit a record high $10,845 in March last year.

(By Julia Payne; Editing by Susan Fenton)

BOOM! Case Against Trump IMPLODES: NY Cops In Revolt as Chris Rock, Elon...

Monday, March 20, 2023

Jonathan Turley: Manhattan DA’s Potential Case Against Trump ‘Legally Pathetic’

Johnathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, offered testimony during the House Judiciary Committee's hearing in Washington on Dec. 4, 2019. (House Judiciary)

Johnathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, offered testimony during the House Judiciary Committee's hearing in Washington on Dec. 4, 2019. (House Judiciary)

https://www.theepochtimes.com/jonathan-turley-manhattan-das-potential-case-against-trump-legally-pathetic_5133735.html 

George Washington University Law Professor Jonathan Turley panned reports of the looming potential case against former President Donald Trump after the former commander-in-chief announced he may be arrested in the next week.

Alleged unnamed court sources have told multiple news outlets that Trump could be indicted in the near future, while Trump said via Truth Social that he expects to be arrested by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office on Tuesday. Bragg’s office has not publicly confirmed reports that he may possibly indict the former president for allegedly misclassifying a $130,000 hush payment made to Stormy Daniels in 2016.

Trump has denied claims that he had an affair with Daniels in the early 2000s.  However, unconfirmed reports alleged that a grand jury in New York has been empaneled and may be seeking an indictment of the former president.

But Turley said that based on those reports, the DA’s case against Trump “is legally pathetic” and “is struggling to twist state laws to effectively prosecute a federal case long ago rejected by the Justice Department against Trump.”

“In 2018 (yes, that is how long this theory has been around), I wrote how difficult such a federal case would be under existing election laws. Now, six years later, the same theory may be shoehorned into a state claim,” wrote Turley, who was a former expert witness for Trump’s first impeachment trial, for The Hill.

“While we still do not know the specific state charges in the anticipated indictment, the most-discussed would fall under Section 175 for falsifying business records, based on the claim that Trump used legal expenses to conceal the alleged hush-payments that were supposedly used to violate federal election laws,” Turley said. “While some legal experts have insisted such concealment is clearly a criminal matter that must be charged, they were conspicuously silent when Hillary Clinton faced a not-dissimilar campaign-finance allegation.

He noted that a Section 175 charge “would normally be a misdemeanor” and that the “only way to convert it into a Class E felony requires a showing that the ‘intent to defraud includes an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof.’ That other crime would appear to be the federal election violations which the Justice Department previously declined to charge.”

Bragg’s office, meanwhile, could not prosecute the charge as a misdemeanor as it falls outside the two-year statute of limitations, Turley wrote. Instead, Bragg would have to pursue a felony charge.

“Prosecutors working under Bragg’s predecessor, Cyrus Vance Jr., also reportedly rejected the viability of using a New York law to effectively charge a federal offense,” Turley noted.  Bragg also previously expressed doubts about the Daniels case and shut it down when he took office several years ago, he said, adding that two lead prosecutors resigned at the time.

If Trump is indicted, it may require Trump to travel to the district attorney’s office in downtown New York to surrender. In white-collar cases, the defendant’s lawyers and prosecutors typically agree on a date and time, rather than arresting the person at home.

Trump would have his fingerprints and mugshot taken and would appear for arraignment in court. He would likely be released on his own recognizance and allowed to head home, legal analysts told Reuters.

Trump’s lawyer, Joe Tacopina, told CNBC on Friday that Trump would surrender if charged. If Trump refused to come in voluntarily, prosecutors could seek to have him extradited from Florida, where he currently resides.

On Saturday, Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement that the former president has not been formally notified of any pending arrest. Both Cheung and Trump accused Bragg, a Democrat who received $1 million in campaign cash from a George Soros-linked organization, of targeting him for political gain and could try to seek dismissal of the charges on those grounds.

“There has been no notification, other than illegal leaks from the Justice Dept. and the DA’s office, to NBC and other fake news carriers, that the George Soros-funded Radical Left Democrat prosecutor in Manhattan has decided to take his Witch-Hunt to the next level,” Cheung said. “President Trump is rightfully highlighting his innocence and the weaponization of our injustice system,” he added.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office has not responded to a request for comment.

Reuters contributed to this report.

Sunday, March 19, 2023

Trump Suggests He Will Be Arrested Next Week

Former President Donald Trump speaks to reporters before his speech at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center National Harbor, Md., on March 4, 2023. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Former President Donald Trump speaks to reporters before his speech at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center National Harbor, Md., on March 4, 2023. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

https://www.theepochtimes.com/trump-addresses-indictment-rumors-calls-for-supporters-to-protest-take-our-nation-back_5132504.html?ea_src=frontpage_A_topstory&ea_med=list 

Former President Donald Trump has issued a statement saying he expects to be indicted next week by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and called his supporters to protest and “take our nation back!”

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office is investigating Trump for his company’s classification of a $130,000 reimbursement to his former personal attorney Michael Cohen over a payment allegedly made to adult actress Stormy Daniels.

The former president has repeatedly condemned the probe as a partisan witch hunt and in a Saturday statement on Truth Social, Trump doubled down on his rhetoric.

Trump said that “illegal leaks” from the “corrupt & highly political” Manhattan DA’s office indicate that he will be arrested on Tuesday of next week. He insisted that no crime has been proven and that the possible indictment in the case would be “based on an old & fully debunked (by numerous other prosecutors!) fairy tale.”

“Protest, take our nation back!” Trump urged his supporters in the message.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office declined to comment on Trump’s statement.

‘Witch Hunt’

Trump’s possible indictment stems from the alleged misclassifying of a $130,000 hush payment made to Daniels not to disclose an affair between the two, which Trump has denied. A grand jury was empaneled in the case and expectations have been building for an indictment.

Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement that the former president has not been formally notified of any pending arrest.

“There has been no notification, other than illegal leaks from the Justice Dept. and the DA’s office, to NBC and other fake news carriers, that the George Soros-funded Radical Left Democrat prosecutor in Manhattan has decided to take his Witch-Hunt to the next level,” Cheung said.

“President Trump is rightfully highlighting his innocence and the weaponization of our injustice system,” he added.

Cheung told Fox News in a statement Friday that Trump is “completely innocent” and that the probe is a politically motivated attack to hamstring his run for reelection in 2024.

“Democrats are at it again, pushing the ‘Nuclear Button’ and attacking a President because of a disgraced extortionist,” Cheung said. “This will backfire massively for the Democrat Party, and end in disgrace for our Nation.”

The idea that a possible indictment and arrest of Trump would backfire was taken up by several prominent public figures, including Tesla CEO Elon Musk.

Musk said in a post on Twitter that he believes if Trump is indeed arrested next week, the former president “will be re-elected in a landslide victory.”

Trump’s lawyer, Joseph Tacopina, told MSNBC that if the former president is indeed indicted, he would “follow normal procedures” and surrender.

Rumors of the indictment and what would be an unprecedented arrest of a former president have prompted reports that law enforcement agencies are bracing for protests and making security arrangements.

An indictment would involve setting a date and time for Trump to surrender, with the former president then delivered by his Secret Service detail to the Manhattan DA’s office for fingerprinting and mugshots. Following arrest processing in cases where a defendant is allowed to surrender, normal procedures suggest Trump would face an arraignment before a judge and then probably be released on his own recognizance.

Former GOP congressman and Truth Social head Devin Nunes told Newsmax on Friday that reports of the possible indictment show the nation is becoming a “banana republic” where the justice system is used as a weapon against political rivals.

“As I’ve said for a very long time now, as the person who led the investigation into the Russia hoax, that we have slipped into a banana republic in this country where you have a two-tiered system of justice, where Democrats run scot-free, and then someone like President Trump, or other Republicans, are held to this ridiculous standard,” Nunes told the outlet.

Nunes, like Musk, believes that a Trump indictment would backfire.

“If they do move forward and indict, it’ll just make it even easier for President Trump to win election because people are going to see this for what it is,” Nunes said. “[It is] just a farce, and another attack on Trump at all costs to stop him from becoming president again.”

Gary Bai and Zachary Stieber contributed to this report. This article has been updated with comment from Trump’s spokesperson.