Sliding Libyan oil output, good omen for Nigeria

The fall-out of the Libyan political crisis that nearly crippled the country’s oil production may boost Nigeria’s exports of sweet crude next month. As traders await the October loading schedule, they confirmed that the development had already impacted positively on September exports, which were reportedly completely sold. There were indications that oil production in the North African country may completely halt soon. Libya had confirmed that oil production fell to around 150,000 barrels per day (bpd), from around 250,000 bpd in August. A board member of Libya’s National Oil Corporation, Bilqasim Shindeer el-Shibany confirmed, “oil exports almost entirely have stopped.” To add to the government’s woes, the capital, Tripoli, has been hit with water cuts for three days and electricity outages for the past few months lasting around four hours daily.  Libya’s prime minister faced increasing calls for his ouster, as strikes by government employees at oil export terminals estimated to have cost the North African country more than $5 billion in losses.

  Nigeria’s light oil is apparently bridging the supply-gap in the market, as it exports 63 cargoes of crude oil, totaling 58.2 million barrels or 1.94 million barrels per day (mbpd) for the month of September 2013.  Angola is closely behind Nigeria, as it unveils plans to export 1.70 mbpd of crude in October, an increase of 30,000 bpd from September, according to a loading schedule. Angola will export 52.8 million barrels on 55 tankers three more than were scheduled to load in September.