Posts tagged 'suez canal'

Iranian navy ships pass through Suez Canal

| Feb 22 2011 21:32 | Comment |

Two Iranian navy ships entered the eastern Mediterranean after passing through the Suez Canal on Tuesday, the first such voyage since 1979 and one that has raised sharp concerns in Israel, reports the FT.  Egyptian officials told Reuters news agency that the two vessels – one frigate and one supply ship – had entered the Suez Canal at 5.45am. They entered the Mediterranean Sea in the late afternoon, according to several reports citing Egyptian authorities. Read more

Mass march to topple Mubarak begins

Joseph joined FT Alphaville way back in March 2010. He likes all the politically and legally fiddly bits of finance. He also likes credit, rates, global macro, tail risk, and all that stuff. (You should email him story ideas. He’ll take anything.)

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| Feb 01 2011 10:02 | Comment |

Around 600,000 demonstrators have so far gathered in the centre of the Egyptian capital to oust President Hosni Mubarak, Al Jazeera TV reports. The country’s army has promised not to resist the protests, while the new vice-president has offered to talk with the political opposition, reports the NYT. As the country’s political crisis comes to a head, uncertainty over its economic effects linger. Convoy systems for shipping on the Suez Canal continued as normal on Monday even as concerns over the canal’s role in supplying oil edged the price of Brent crude above $100, the FT says. A broader fear is any domino effect of unrest on other Arab regimes which supply far more oil to global markets than Egypt, the FT adds. Read more

Oil breaks $100 on Suez fears

| Feb 01 2011 03:22 | Comment |

Oil prices broke through the $100 a barrel level for the first time in more than two years, amid market fears that Egypt’s turmoil will hit oil flows, reports the FT. Although both the Suez Canal and a pipeline linking the Red Sea with the Mediterranean continue to operate, violent protests aimed at ousting Hosni Mubarak, Egypt’s president, has brought much of the economy to a halt. Separately, the FT reports that the world’s shipping industry is closely watching the situation in Egypt and is anxious about any possible disruption in traffic on the strategically vital Suez Canal. FT Alphaville suggests there are also factors other than Egypt driving up crude oil prices. Read more

Oil surges as Egypt protests intensify

| Jan 31 2011 21:20 | Comment |

Oil prices broke through the $100 a barrel level for the first time in more than two years, amid market fears that Egypt’s turmoil will hit oil flows, reports the FT. Although both the Suez Canal and a pipeline linking the Red Sea with the Mediterranean continue to operate, the popular uprising to unseat Hosni Mubarak, Egypt’s president, has brought much of the rest of the economy to a halt. The FT adds that the world’s shipping industry is watching the situation in Egypt especially carefully because of the potential for the country’s unrest to disrupt traffic on the Suez Canal, one of the world’s most important international waterways. Meanwhile, FT Alphaville urges caution on those joining a simple line from Brent at $100 a barrel and fears over the closure of the Suez canal. Read more

Oil spikes, shocks and stocks

| Jan 31 2011 19:17 | Comment |

With oil on the rise, what next for equity markets?

That’s the question KBW try to answer in a note out on Monday. The analysts look for correlations over the last 50 years between big (ten and 20 per cent quarter on quarter) WTI rises and changes in the S&P500 and the Keefe Bank Index. Read more

Suez isn’t Brent’s $100 problem

Joseph joined FT Alphaville way back in March 2010. He likes all the politically and legally fiddly bits of finance. He also likes credit, rates, global macro, tail risk, and all that stuff. (You should email him story ideas. He’ll take anything.)

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| Jan 31 2011 17:46 | Comment |

Brent’s finally done it:

(Reuters) Brent crude oil futures surged above $100 a barrel for the first time in 28 months on Monday on concerns that anti-government protests in Egypt could create instability across the Middle East, possibly disrupting oil shipments through the Suez canal. Read more

The Suez effect on WTI-Brent [updated]

Izabella Kaminska joined FT Alphaville in October 2008. Before that she worked as a producer at CNBC, a natural gas reporter at Platts and an associate editor of BP's internal magazine.

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| Jan 28 2011 16:26 | Comment |

Speculation about the potential closure of the Suez canal is mounting on Friday, probably the reason that WTI prices are heading higher.

Notably, prices of Brent crude (which is not continent-blocked; it comes from the North Sea and doesn’t tend to get transported through the Suez canal) are not climbing. Read more