美国天然气市场复苏

据伍德麦肯兹4月22日报道，在阿尔弗雷德·丁尼生(Alfred Lord Tennyson)的诗中，可怕的巨型乌贼长期沉睡在海底，处于“古老的、无梦的、无意识的”睡眠中，直到它突然醒来，咆哮着浮出水面。美国天然气市场的情况有点类似，自2009年以来，基准Henry Hub天然气均价约为3.30美元/百万英热单位，很少突破5美元/百万英热单位。但本周，近月期货价格自2008年以来首次突破8美元/ 百万英热单位。

尽管天然气价格在周四晚间迅速回落，降至7美元/百万英热单位以下，但加速飙升突显出市场的新趋势。美国天然气的供应侧和需求侧的变化结合在一起，降低了市场灵活性，增加了价格波动性。有充分的理由认为，目前相对较高的价格不会长期持续下去，但至少在一段时间内，肯定有可能出现更高的峰值。

在需求方面，市场缺乏弹性的部分原因是燃煤发电能力的减少。已经有一波已经达到经济寿命的燃煤电厂被关闭，这往往是由于环境法规和企业排放目标推动的。从2015年到2020年，美国每年平均损失11千兆瓦的燃煤发电能力。

这意味着，煤炭对天然气价格的限制能力减弱了。传统意义上，如果天然气价格上涨到足够高的水平，发电企业就会转而燃烧更多煤炭，使市场达到平衡。煤炭产能损失意味着缓冲已经被侵蚀，低库存导致其影响力进一步被削弱。

与此同时，北美天然气市场与世界其他地区联系日益紧密。自从2016年Cheniere能源公司从路易斯安那州Sabine Pass运输第一批货物以来，液化天然气进口增长与全球趋势联系在一起。当全球天然气市场供应过剩时，就像2020年夏季那样，美国液化天然气出口下降，压低了北美价格。

当全球市场供应紧张时，就像今天这样，美国液化天然气出口国满负荷运转。伍德麦肯兹美洲天然气团队研究主管尤金•金(Eugene Kim)表示，这引发了人们的担忧，即美国天然气存储量是否足以维持到明年冬天，这加大了价格上行压力。

与此同时，在供应方面，生产商对高油价的反应在许多情况下受到限制，因为企业承诺维持资本纪律、偿还债务和向投资者返还现金。此前，在海恩斯维尔页岩生产天然气的康斯托克资源公司(Comstock Resources)就是一个很好的例子。在当前天然气价格下，该公司正在产生自由现金流，尽管其已经对冲了大约50%的产量。该公司计划将债务与调整后收益比率从2020年的3.8倍大幅降至今年的1.5倍。该公司宣布，将利用部分现金流，在2025年赎回2.45亿美元优先债券，收益率为7.5%。该公司表示，一旦实现了杠杆率目标，将致力于向股东返还资本。与此同时，该公司计划今年平均总产量增长约为2%-7%。

勘探和生产公司的资本约束意味着，美国4月份天然气产量仅比2021年4月高出约3%。

之所以认为目前的市场状况将是有时间限制的，是因为美国仍有大量天然气储量，可以以相对较低的成本生产。尤金•金(Eugene Kim)表示，“从根本上决定美国天然气长期价格的，是需要引入市场以满足需求的边际天然气成本。得益于丰富的低成本天然气资源，Henry Hub基本价格接近3美元/百万英热单位，而目前市场价格高达8美元/百万英热单位”。

尽管如此，现在天然气市场已经“觉醒”，可能还需要一段时间才能再次进入“休眠”状态，煤炭替代天然气的可能性只会下降。美国目前的燃煤发电能力约为200吉瓦伍德麦肯兹预测，到2030年，这一数字将降至约9000万千瓦。在同一时期，风能和太阳能预计将迅速增长，这可能会造成天然气市场因产量变化而出现额外的失衡。会影响管理天然气价格波动的投资，包括地下储存的投资，可能看起来越来越有吸引力。

油田服务集团哈里伯顿(Halliburton)报告称，第一季度收入增长24%，调整后收益增长44%，并对今年剩余时间里的前景表示乐观。该公司首席执行官杰夫•米勒(Jeff Miller)表示，“我们看到，北美整个油气价值链都存在严重供应紧张。在设备市场几乎售罄的情况下，大宗商品价格的支撑和客户需求的增强，预计将推动完井作业和生产部门的利润率扩大”。

美国联邦储备理事会(美联储)最新能源调查显示，包括俄克拉何马州、科罗拉多州和怀俄明州在内的联邦储备区的石油生产商表示，在平均每桶62美元的原油价格下钻井是有利可图的，当价格到达每桶86美元，就可以大幅增加活动。

王佳晶 摘译自 伍德麦肯兹

原文如下：

The US natural gas market wakes up

The Kraken, the monstrous giant squid in Alfred Lord Tennyson’s poem, lies for long ages at the bottom of the ocean in “ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep”, until suddenly it wakes and rises roaring to the surface. The US natural gas market has been a bit like that. Since 2009, benchmark Henry Hub gas has averaged about $3.30 per million British Thermal Units, and has only rarely spiked above $5. But this week, the front month futures price went above $8 / mmBTU, for the first time since 2008.

Although gas prices quickly fell back — the futures were back below $7 / mmBTU on Thursday evening — the price spike has highlighted the new dynamics in the market. Changes on both the supply side and the demand side for US gas are combining to reduce flexibility and increase price volatility. There are good reasons to think that the current (relatively) high prices will not last in the long term. But for a while at least, further spikes are definitely possible.

On the demand side, the inflexibility in the market is being created in part by the loss of coal-fired power generation capacity. There has been a wave of shutdowns of coal-fired plants that have reached the end of their economic lives, often hastened by environmental regulations and corporate emissions goals. The US lost an average of 11 gigawatts of coal-fired generation capacity every year between 2015 and 2020.

That means coal is less able to act to put a cap on gas prices. Traditionally, if gas prices rose high enough, generators would switch to burning more coal, bringing the market into balance. The loss of coal capacity means that buffer has been eroded. Low thermal coal stockpiles have weakened it further.

At the same time, North America’s gas market is becoming increasingly connected to the rest of the world. once largely sealed off in splendid isolation, it has been linked to global trends by the growth of LNG imports since Cheniere Energy shipped its first cargo from Sabine Pass Louisiana in 2016. When the global gas market is oversupplied, as it was in the summer of 2020, US LNG exports drop, driving down prices in North America.

When global markets are tight, as they are today, US LNG exporters run at full capacity. That has been stoking concerns over whether gas in storage in the US will be adequate going into next winter, contributing to the upward pressure on prices, says Eugene Kim, a research director on Wood Mackenzie’s Americas gas team.

On the supply side, meanwhile, producers’ responses to high prices are being constrained in many cases by companies’ commitments to maintaining capital discipline, paying down debt and returning cash to investors. There was a good example of this last week from Comstock Resources, which produces gas in the Haynesville Shale. It is generating free cash at current gas prices, even though it has hedged about 50% of its production. It is planning a steep reduction in its debt, from 3.8 times adjusted earnings in 2020 to 1.5 times this year, and announced last week that it would use some of its cash flow to redeem US$245 million of 7.5% senior notes, due 2025. once its leverage ratio target has been achieved, the company says, it will aim to return capital to shareholders. Meanwhile it is planning for average overall production growth of roughly 2-7% this year.

That capital discipline among E&P companies means that US gas production this month is running only about 3% higher than in April 2021.

The reason to think that current market conditions will be time limited is that the US still has very large gas reserves that can be produced at relatively low cost. “What sets the long-term price of US gas fundamentally is the marginal gas molecule required to be brought into the marketplace to meet demand,” Eugene Kim says. “Blessed with plentiful low-cost gas resources, the fundamental price of Henry Hub is closer to $3/mmBTU, rather than the current market prices that have been as high as $8/mmBTU.”

Still, now the gas market has been woken up, it may be a while before it goes back to sleep again. The availability of coal as an alternative to gas is only going to decline. The US today has about 200 gigawatts of coal-fired generation capacity. Wood Mackenzie forecasts that by 2030, that will have dropped to only about 90 GW. Over the same period, wind and solar power are expected to grow rapidly, creating a threat of additional gas market imbalances caused by variations in their output. Investments to help manage gas price volatility, including underground storage, may look increasingly attractive.

In brief

Halliburton, the oilfield services group, reported a 24% jump in revenues and a 44% increase in adjusted earnings for the first quarter, and gave an upbeat view of its prospects for the rest of the year. Chief executive Jeff Miller said: “We see significant tightness across the entire oil and gas value chain in North America. Supportive commodity prices and strengthening customer demand against an almost sold-out equipment market are expected to drive expansion in Completion and Production division margins.”

Oil producers in the Federal Reserve district that includes Oklahoma, Colorado and Wyoming say they need on average a crude price of $62 per barrel for drilling to be profitable, but $86 per barrel for a substantial increase in activity, according to the latest energy survey from the Kansas City Fed.