FSMR Sticks to Oil Price Forecast Again

Fitch Solutions Macro Research (FSMR) has left its Brent crude price forecasts unchanged for the second time in a row, the company’s latest oil outlook report has revealed.

The report outlines that FSMR sees Brent averaging $64 per barrel this year, $62 per barrel in 2020, $58 per barrel in 2021, $59 per barrel in 2022 and $61 per barrel in 2023. The same projections were made in the company’s two previous oil price outlooks.

“This month we continue to hold to our current forecast for Brent crude to fall from an average of $64 per barrel in 2019 to $62 per barrel and $58 per barrel in 2020 and 2021, respectively,” FSMR analysts stated in the report, which was sent to Rigzone on Wednesday.

“Economic and trade activity should stabilize in 2020, although any marginal recovery in demand as a consequence will prove insufficient to propel prices higher in light of sharp acceleration in global supply growth,” the analysts added.

“On the whole, we forecast net supply growth of 1.7 million barrels per day year on year for 2020, which sits in stark contrast to the circa 700,000 barrel per day contraction we estimate for 2019,” the analysts continued.

Last month, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) forecasted in its short term energy outlook (STEO) that Brent spot prices will average $63.59 per barrel in 2019 and $60.10 per barrel in 2020. The EIA’s previous STEO forecasted that Brent spot prices would average $63.37 per barrel in 2019 and $59.93 per barrel in 2020.

To contact the author, email andreas.exarheas@rigzone.com