Latest news with #LizHampton
Yahoo
25-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
US crude and fuel inventories fall on higher demand, EIA says
By Liz Hampton and Georgina McCartney DENVER (Reuters) -U.S. crude oil and fuel inventories fell last week as refining activity and demand rose, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) said on Wednesday. Crude inventories fell by 5.8 million barrels to 415.1 million barrels in the week ending June 20, the EIA said, exceeding analysts' expectations in a Reuters poll for a 797,000-barrel draw. Crude stocks at the Cushing, Oklahoma, delivery hub fell by 464,000 barrels in the week, the EIA said. "This week the report is about supply and demand. Gasoline demand was up, and a substantial drawdown in stocks is going to give the market chance to stabilize after all the geopolitical reports," said Phil Flynn, a senior analyst with Price Futures Group. Oil prices rose following the larger-than-expected decline in stockpiles. Global benchmark Brent crude futures were trading at $67.97 a barrel, up 83 cents, by 10:55 a.m. EDT (1455 GMT), while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude (WTI) rose 90 cents to $65.27 a barrel. Refinery crude runs increased by 125,000 barrels per day, the EIA said, while utilization rates rose by 1.5 percentage points to 94.7% of total capacity, its highest level since July 2024. Gasoline stocks fell by 2.1 million barrels to 227.9 million barrels, also more than analysts' expectations for a 381,000-barrel build. Gasoline supplied, a proxy for demand, rose 389,000 bpd last week to 9.7 million bpd, its highest since December 2021. Distillate stockpiles, which include diesel and heating oil, fell by 4.1 million barrels to 105.3 million barrels, versus forecasts for a 410,000-barrel rise, the data showed. Net U.S. crude imports rose last week by 531,000 bpd, the EIA said.
Yahoo
27-01-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
US power stocks plummet as DeepSeek raises data center demand doubts
By Laila Kearney and Liz Hampton NEW YORK/HOUSTON (Reuters) - Shares of U.S. power, utility and natural gas companies sold off on Monday in some of the biggest recorded one-day drops, as new AI technology from Chinese start-up DeepSeek cast doubt on a projected surge in U.S. electricity demand and tech spending. Power producers were among the biggest winners in the S&P 500 last year on expectations of ballooning demand from the energy-guzzling data centers needed to scale Big Tech's artificial intelligence technologies. The wider adoption of AI models like the one developed by DeepSeek, which it says it built in under two months and is cheaper than models currently used by U.S. companies, could result in less electricity demand overall and result in a smaller power build-out, analysts and economists said. "If proven true, the efficiencies used within DeepSeek's open-source model can be applied by the hyperscalers to their models, which would result in a more moderated demand," analysts with Evercore ISI said in a note. Big Tech firms, which are also known as hyperscaling data center developers, have devoted tens of billions of dollars in AI data center development over the last year. In the U.S., data centers consumed roughly 4.4% of electricity in 2023 but are anticipated to use 6.7% to 12% of all power by 2028, according to a report produced by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Independent power provider Constellation Energy, whose shares had shot up about 100% in 2024 largely on its ability to sell nuclear and gas-fired power to U.S. data centers, sunk by about 20% in trading on Monday after news of DeepSeek's advancements. Vistra was down 30% and rival Talen Energy Corp was down 22%. DeepSeek AI could also threaten the dominance of current AI leaders, which are based in Silicon Valley, and slow their deployment of data centers. DeepSeek's AI assistance had overtaken U.S. rival ChatGPT in downloads from Apple's app store on Monday. But with the wider adoption of AI, even with more energy-efficient models, power demand could surge everywhere, said Ed Hirs, an energy economist at the University of Houston. He cautioned that a sell-off of power stocks could be short-sighted and short-lived. "In this instance, if DeepSeek turns out to be what everybody wants, and they sell to U.S. companies, and the U.S. companies change their algorithms to adopt to it, it just means a greater, faster broader development," Hirs said. Still, electricity companies, and even producers of feedstocks related to power generation, were under pressure. Earlier this month, Constellation acquired private natural gas producer Calpine Energy for $16.4 billion in one of the largest U.S. power industry deals ever, a sign of rising expectations that demand for gas will grow as a generation source for AI. Shares of publicly-traded producers of natural gas, which makes up the biggest share of fuels used to generate electricity in the United States, also slumped. EQT Corp was off 9%. Midstream operator Energy Transfer, which said it has received connection requests from dozens of data centers, was down about 7%.
