Oil Chiefs See $60 Oil as Breaking Point for Shale Growth

Top executives from supermajors, the U.S. shale patch, and national oil companies remain bullish about the oil market in the medium and long term, expecting growing demand and the downturn in oil prices to eventually rebalance supply and demand from the looming glut.

At the Energy Intelligence Forum in London this week, the oil bosses acknowledged the bearish short-term fundamentals as supply growth outpaces the increase in demand. But they also see the market rebalancing in the medium term and supply struggling to catch up with demand in the long term.

Everyone concurs that there will be a glut in the short term; projections vary only about how big the oversupply will become later this year and early next year.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) this week warned, again, that soaring supply and “subdued” demand would bloat the oversupply to record levels.

Surging Middle East supply, combined with robust flows from the Americas, boosted oil on water in September by a massive 102 million barrels, equivalent to 3.4 million barrels per day (bpd), which is the largest increase since the pandemic, the agency said in its monthly report.

Related: North Sea Oil: Booming in Norway and Doomed in the UK

“Looking ahead, as the significant volumes of crude oil on water move onshore to major oil hubs, crude stocks look set to surge while NGLs start to drop,” the IEA noted.

Oil executives may be concerned about falling oil prices and declining profits in the short term, but they have seen their fair share of periods of oversupply and remain upbeat about the medium and long term.

“Fundamentally, the short term market is a little bearish,” Patrick Pouyanne, the chief executive of TotalEnergies, said at the forum.

“But we are quite bullish on the medium-term,” the executive added, pointing out to production decline rates and continued growth in global oil demand.

Non-OPEC crude production will begin to decline when oil prices are at $60 per barrel and lower, Pouyanne noted.

“There is a point at $60 per barrel where we’ll see the shale industry beginning to slow down,” Pouyanne said on the sidelines of the forum, as carried by Reuters.

“Our view is that from mid-2026 non-OPEC supply will be much lower, no growth, and then OPEC will be regaining control of the market,” TotalEnergies’ top executive said.

Ryan Lance, chairman and CEO of ConocoPhillips, said that “At $60-$65 a barrel WTI oil prices, the US is probably plateau-ish.”

U.S. oil output could grow by between 300,000 bpd and 400,000 bpd this year, Lance said.

“But if prices stay at $60 or go into the $50s, you probably are plateauing or slightly declining,” the executive added.

ExxonMobil’s CEO Darren Woods believes the glut will be just a short-term issue in markets, and the bigger issue will be how supply will meet demand in the medium and long term.

“Oil market oversupply is likely to be a short-term issue, with demand from emerging economies set to make meeting global energy demand more challenging in the medium to longer term,” Woods said at the forum in London.

“We continue to do the same thing under the Biden administration and under the Trump administration,” Exxon’s top executive said.

Exxon “look beyond political cycles and think fundamentally about the long-term fundamentals of economic growth around the world.”

Amin Nasser, the chief executive of the Saudi state oil giant Aramco, said in a speech at the forum that the energy transition faces a reality check and reality on the ground points not to an energy transition, but to “an energy addition which requires all hands on deck.”

“We also see resilient demand, and the pressing need for long-term investments in supply is now widely accepted. So, our growth potential in oil remains large,” Nasser said.

Despite the bearish short-term fundamentals, the long-term prospects and the need for more supply years from now remain intact, according to the executives.

“The key strategic question for companies like mine and others is, where is the conventional oil going to come from to satisfy the demand in the face of plateauing or peaking U.S. unconventional supply, as demand continues to grow,” ConocoPhillips’ Lance said.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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