Oil Market Report

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Stocks Crude Oil in Terms of Days of Forward Refinery Throughputs	Days of forward coverage are calculated on the basis of the average refinery throughput of crude oil for the next month.
Stocks Days of Forward Demand	These are calculated on the basis of the average daily demand for the next three months. Stock comparisons with previous years are made in volume terms and days of forward demand. Comparisons in absolute terms effectively understate the differences since they ignore any growth in demand which increases operating minima while comparisons in days of forward demand tend to overstate differences since operating minima increase by less in percentage terms than the growth in demand. They also depend on the accuracy of the demand forecast.
Stocks Days of IEA Net Imports	Stocks are calculated according to IEA methodology in terms of net imports of crude oil and products of the previous year.
Stocks Floating Storage/Oil in Transit	Changes in floating storage/oil in transit in Table 1 represent estimates of the change in global crude oil stocks in transit at sea between producing and consuming countries or held in moored tankers used for temporary storage.
Stocks Government-Controlled Stocks	Primary stocks, exclusively for emergency purposes, owned by governments and organisations that have been established to hold stocks (stock-holding organisations).
Stocks Industry Stocks	Primary stocks owned by oil companies, traders and other organisations except those holding government-controlled stocks. They include stocks held by industry to meet IEA, EU and national emergency reserve commitments.
Stocks Primary Stocks	Unless stated otherwise, all stocks included in the report are primary. They include stocks held in refineries, natural gas processing plants, oil terminals and entrepôts (where these are known), pipelines and stocks held on board incoming ocean vessels in port or at mooring. They exclude power station stocks (since demand is reported as deliveries from primary stocks). They are on a national territory basis, i.e. they include all primary stocks within the national boundaries regardless of ownership (stocks held abroad by government or companies are thus excluded). Note that stocks prior to 1 January 1991 are reported on an ownership basis (see OMR dated 7 July 1994 for more information on the change in methodology).
Stocks Secondary Stocks	Secondary Stocks are stocks held by power stations, minor bulk plants and wholesalers.
Stocks Stock Change	Stock Change is the difference between stock levels at the beginning and end of the period. A negative number indicates a stockdraw while a positive number represents a stockbuild.
Stocks Tertiary Stocks	Tertiary Stocks are stocks held by end-consumers including industry, commerce and private stocks.
Stocks What is Counted and How	Stocks in ‘secondary’ storage facilities held by ‘middlemen’ (jobbers and dealers) and ‘tertiary’ stocks held by consumers are not counted. Movements into and among these secondary and tertiary stock levels are subsumed in the demand estimates. Since OECD secondary and tertiary industry stocks and non-OECD stocks are not specifically accounted for in our World Oil Supply and Demand Balances (Table 1 of the report), developments related to changes in these stock holdings are reflected in the ‘Miscellaneous-to-Balance’ category. The latter includes changes in non-reported stocks and statistical difference. The report uses two sources of data to derive OECD industry stock positions. For its ‘preliminary’ estimates of the preceding month stocks (M-1), the report bases its calculations on publicly available data. The estimated stock position for each OECD country is obtained by adding any stock change reported by public sources in that country during M-1 to the official stock data for M-2 submitted to the IEA by that country in its Monthly Oil Statistics (MOS) questionnaire (see below). It is important to recognise that these preliminary estimates are derived. They are not stock levels reported by countries to the IEA but rather the likely inventory position that would result from the application of publicly reported stock changes to the officially reported stock positions for the month before. For Europe, for example, Euroilstock data are used. In the case of the US, weekly and monthly data published by the Energy Information Administration are employed. (M-1 stock changes from the JODI questionnaire are used, for some OECD countries, when data quality has been proven based on the history of their comparability with officially submitted data through the MOS). For those countries for which there are no published stock data available for M-1, stock levels are kept unchanged from the previous month. This applies, for example, in Asia-Pacific to Australia and New Zealand, and in Europe to the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Switzerland and Turkey. The data sources from which the preliminary estimates are calculated are as follows: Country Source Canada Statistics Cnada EU plus Norway Euroilstock Japan METI Joint Oil Data Initiative (JODI) Korea KNOC Mexico PEMEX US EIA Weekly and Monthly Petroleum Status Reptor It should be emphasised that the report applies a statistical methodology to standardise preliminary stock estimates across the various OECD regions. For instance, definitions of what constitute ‘distillates’ differ across reporting countries. For example, weekly distillate stock data reported by the US Energy Information Administration cover heating oil and diesel only. The middle distillate category used in the OMR has a broader definition as, in addition to heating oil and diesel, it also includes the product jet-kerosene. As such, the report modifies the publicly available data to conform to the IEA’s MOS definitions. This means that IEA adjustments will differ slightly from those reported by the public sources. In months prior to preliminary (M-1) estimates, the report publishes stock data drawn from the MOS questionnaire submitted by OECD Member governments. MOS data, referred to as (M-2) data, are the latest official submission by Member governments for the month prior to that of the preliminary estimate. MOS collects detailed stock information on a national territory basis, including primary industry stocks held on land and in ports. MOS data for a given month are subject to revision with subsequent MOS submissions as more complete information becomes available from Member governments. Revisions to MOS stock data are systematically smaller than revisions made to preliminary data.
Stocks Independent Storage	Storage owned by independent operators and rented to third parties. Mostly located at worlds refining and trading hubs in the Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp (ARA) area, New York Harbor, Singapore and the Caribbean. Independent oil stocks represent a small but important part of total industry stocks as they give a key indicator of what is happening to discretionary stocks. Information on independent storage can be difficult to collect as it is often considered proprietary information by producing countries and data often lie outside the more formal data collection systems.
Stocks Discretionary stocks	Stocks available to industry to use as and when it pleases. Discretionary stocks typically only represent 10% of total industry stocks. Often used with financial instruments as investment.
Stocks Minimum Operating Levels	The amount of oil stocks required to keep the global supply system operating efficiently. Includes tank bottoms, pipeline fill, etc.
Stocks Miscellaneous to Balance	Balancing item in the World Oil Supply and Demand Balances (Table 1 of the Report). Includes changes to non-reported OECD and non-OECD stocks as well as the statistical differences between demand and supply. A positive miscellaneous to balance could represent timing differences between crude supply and product demand, overstated supply, understated demand, unreported and understated stock changes or any combination of the above.