Key Petroleum (ASX:KEY) managing director Kane Marshall told * last week he thinks the sector may bounce as soon as July — once the new financial year starts and as junior explorers’ investment credentials are re-rated.
Blue Energy boss John Phillips agrees, saying a structural oil shortage has already started to appear.
Demand is rising at 1.3 per cent a year, but reserves are not being replaced: consultancy Rystad said last year the number of oil discoveries in 2017 was the lowest since the 1940s.
OECD oil storage is now at, or slightly below the five-year average, Mr Phillips said in the last Blue Energy quarterly report.
“There will be a price response as supply lags consumption, and that has started happening, we’re in balance,” he told *.
As such, conditions may be right to flush some blood back into Australia’s desiccated oil sector.