Oil & Gas Corner

Friday, 2026-09-11 · covering the last 24h

Market signal

Brent tumbles 2.9% as Gulf states plan a rare sit-down with Iran. Brent fell to $104.52/bbl and WTI slid below $100 to roughly $99.66 Friday — even after both benchmarks had just posted their sharpest weekly gains in months — after the Financial Times reported GCC foreign ministers will meet their Iranian counterpart on Monday, the first such gathering since the war began, as Oman and Iran push a plan to temporarily manage Hormuz traffic. Fortune · CNBC

Baker Hughes: US rig count rises for the first time in a month. The domestic count added three rigs to reach 591, its highest since mid-August, with oil rigs up one to 450 and gas rigs up two to 132. BOE Report

Upstream — exploration & production

Saudi Arabia shuts its 7 million-b/d Hormuz-bypass pipeline after drone strikes launched from Iraq. Drones hit pumping stations on the East-West pipeline near Riyadh and Medina Thursday, sparking fires and injuries; the energy ministry shut the line as a precaution, and Riyadh is holding off retaliation at the request of Iraq's prime minister, leaving no restart timeline for the route that lets Saudi crude reach the Red Sea without transiting the Strait. CNBC · Bloomberg (paywall)

Saudi crude output fell to its lowest since 1990 in August. Production dropped 1.9 million b/d to 6.238 million b/d, per secondary-source estimates reported by Reuters, undercutting even April's wartime low as attacks on export routes keep outpacing the kingdom's ability to move barrels. Reuters (via Investing.com)

Midstream — pipelines, LNG & shipping

Houthis seize Mocha and a Bab el-Mandeb island, tightening their grip on Saudi Arabia's other export route. Yemen's Houthis captured the port of Mocha and then Perim island days later, extending control over a Red Sea chokepoint Riyadh has leaned on harder as Hormuz stays disrupted; Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman phoned President Trump twice Thursday urging direct US strikes on Houthi positions, which Trump turned down in favor of intelligence and targeting support from the roughly 200 US personnel already in the kingdom. Axios · NBC News

TotalEnergies takes "decisive steps" toward a Papua LNG FID. The company completed EPC tendering this week, said design changes and rebidding have cut projected capex by nearly $4 billion to about $14 billion, and will hand operatorship to ExxonMobil in a reshuffled stake (TotalEnergies to 20%, ExxonMobil 34.1% and operator) as the venture nears a final investment decision. TotalEnergies

Downstream — refining, fuels & chemicals

Dangote Refinery opens a ₦2.15 trillion IPO ahead of its September 14 Lagos listing. The Nigerian refiner, which says it has become Europe's largest jet-fuel supplier, is offering 4.1 billion shares at ₦525 each on the Nigerian Exchange as part of a plan to double capacity to 1.4 million b/d by 2028. Vanguard News

No new restart timeline for Aramco's 400,000 b/d Jazan refinery, still offline since July; diesel cracks remain pinned near the record above $106/bbl set last week, with no fresh catalyst since Wednesday's report.

The Chatter

Javier Blas — Bloomberg Opinion (X): pushing back on claims that the East-West pipeline is a sitting duck for drones, Blas argues the comparison misses the pipeline's demonstrated resilience — unlike the Maginot Line, which fell in five days, this route has kept oil moving for roughly 130 days under repeated attack. Post

the deep dive (newsletter): in "Rumors Say Saudi Crude Is Offline — Here's What's Confirmed So Far," the outlet separates verified facts (the ministry-confirmed shutdown) from unverified satellite-fueled claims of catastrophic, multi-point pipeline damage, arguing traders piling into the rally on unconfirmed reports risk a sharp reversal if the damage proves limited. Post