Travel through three checkpoints on the Ukrainian-Polish border may be complicated due to protests on February 2-3, the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine has said.
“On February 2 and 3, 2023 on the access roads to the checkpoints “Korchova – Krakivets”, “Medika – Shehyni” and on February 2, 2023 on the access road to the checkpoint “Hrebenne – Rava-Russkaya” from the Polish side, protests are planned, which may affect the movement of vehicles crossing the state border. Please consider this information in order to properly plan your trips”, – reported in Telegram-channel of the State Border Service.
The border service does not report on the exact location of the protests and the demands of the protesters.
Source: https://t.me/DPSUkr/9345
Oil prices are actively rising on Thursday morning, recovering after falling to a three-week low the day before on data on another increase in U.S. fuel inventories.
The price of April futures for Brent on London’s ICE Futures Exchange stood at $83.55 a barrel by 7:05 a.m., $0.71 (0.86%) above the previous session’s closing price. Those contracts fell by $2.62 (3.1%) to $82.84 per barrel at the close of trading on Wednesday.
The price of WTI futures for March at electronic trades of the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) is $77.17 per barrel by that time, which is $0.76 (0.99%) above the final value of the previous session. The contract fell by $2.46 (3.1%) to $76.41 a barrel at the previous session, its lowest level since January 10.
The day before the US Department of Energy announced that crude stocks in the country grew by 4.14 mln barrels last week. Growth rate has been recorded for six weeks in a row. Analysts polled by Bloomberg expected a decrease in oil reserves by 1 million barrels.
Meanwhile, marketable gasoline reserves rose by 2.58 million barrels and distillates by 2.32 million barrels. Experts had expected gasoline inventories to increase by 2 million barrels and distillate inventories to decrease by 1.5 million barrels.
“The Department of Energy data pointed to an unexpected increase in inventories of all fuels,” said Tariq Zahir, managing partner at Tyche Capital Advisors. The weakness in the oil market may well last, and additional declines will be an opportunity to open long positions, he added.
Also on Wednesday, it became known that the ministers of the monitoring committee of OPEC+ (JMMC), considering the data on production for November and December 2022, recommended not to change the quotas on oil production. The next JMMC meeting is scheduled for April 3, 2023.
In addition, a key event for global markets was the Federal Reserve’s first meeting of the year. The Fed expectedly raised its key interest rate by 25 basis points and said it expects more rate hikes to return inflation to its 2% target.
“Those statements sounded pretty hawkish,” said Tyche Capital’s Zaheer.
Gold and silver prices are expected to rise in 2023 amid a weaker U.S. dollar and the Federal Reserve’s easing of monetary policy, analysts believe.
The London Bullion Market Association’s (LBMA) annual survey of 30 analysts pointed to cautious optimism about the prices of the metals. Experts expect gold and silver to be 3.3% and 8.8% more expensive on average by the end of this year compared to 2022.
Among the key factors that may trigger higher prices, 43% of respondents named the decline of the U.S. dollar and the Fed’s monetary policy, while 14% mentioned inflation and 11% mentioned geopolitical factors.
Analysts predicted an average gold price of $1859.90 per troy ounce, but the range remains wide at $1594 to $2025 per ounce. That range is in line with last year’s forecast, the LBMA notes. The average gold price in 2022 was $1800.09 per ounce.
Silver prices this year are expected to rise to $23.65 an ounce from $21.73 an ounce in 2022. The lower end of the forecast is $17.50 an ounce and the upper end is $27.
Analysts are much less optimistic about palladium prices where they expect a 14.3% decline to $1809.80 per ounce in 2023. The average price in 2022 will be $2112.06 per ounce.
Meanwhile, platinum prices are expected to rise 12.5% this year from the 2022 average price of $1080.4 per ounce. The forecast range is $988-1241 per ounce.
Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has called on the Georgian leadership to release Ukrainian citizen and former Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili.
“Right now a Ukrainian citizen, former Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili is being slowly killed. The very fact that we still have to fight such an attempt to de facto publicly execute a man in Europe in the XXI century – it’s a shame!”, – wrote Zelensky in his twitter.
In this regard, he called on the Georgian authorities to implement the obligations under European norms of human rights protection and to release Saakashvili.
“Given the threat to his life, I call on the Georgian authorities to remember their obligations under the European norms of human rights protection, stop the abuses and release Mikhail! Ukraine has offered solutions. I call on the world to help save Mikhail’s life and prevent his execution,” the president wrote.
Earlier in Kiev, during a press conference with the head of Austria Alexander Von der Bellen, Zielenski showed journalists the photos of the emaciated former president of Georgia, which he had been given and expressed his confidence that the Georgian leadership intends to kill Mikheil Saakashvili.
As it was reported, Saakashvili secretly arrived in Georgia on September 29, 2021. On October 1, he was detained in Tbilisi, after which he was placed in a prison in the city of Rustavi, where he went on hunger strike. On November 8, he was transferred from the Rustavi prison to the prison hospital in Tbilisi (Gldani district) without the consent of his relatives and lawyers. On November 20, Saakashvili was transferred to a military hospital in the city of Gori, where he ended his hunger strike. On May 12 last year, Saakashvili was admitted to the Vivamed civilian clinic in Tbilisi, where he remains today.
On February 1, at a trial on the possible postponement of his prison sentence, Saakashvili said via video link that he was in extremely serious condition and required the necessary treatment. After he tried to take off his shirt and show them his emaciated body, the video link was cut.
In Georgia, the ex-president is being prosecuted in several criminal cases. He considers his detention illegal and the accusations against him trumped up.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Alexey Reznikov and French Defense Minister Sébastien Lecorniou signed a memorandum with Thales Group on the supply of GM 200 radar systems for Ukraine’s air defense.
“Together with my French colleague Sébastien Lecorniou, we signed a memorandum with Thales Group for the supply of MG-200 radars for Ukraine’s air defense. This equipment will help us detect enemy drones and missiles, including ballistic missiles. Our skies will be protected from Russia’s deadly attacks,” he wrote on Twitter on Wednesday.
Seaports in 2022 transshipped 59 million tons of cargo, providing 54% of exports from the country, compared to the indicator in 2021 – 153.7 million tons – a drop of 2.6 times, the Administration of Ukrainian Sea Ports (AMPU) said in a message on Facebook.
According to it, 47.8 million tons of cargo was shipped for export, which is almost 2.5 times less than in pre-war 2021, while imports were almost 4 times less – 6.2 million tons.
It is specified that the turnover of cargo of the Odessa port in comparison with indicators of 2021 decreased from 22.56 million tons to 7.69 million tons, port “Pivdenniy” – from 53.47 million tons to 15.28 million tons, “Chernomorsk” – from 25.63 million tons to 11.8 million tons. – from 25.63 million tons to 11.76 million tons.
Ukrainian ports mostly transshipped grain cargoes, which provided almost half of the total volume – 28.8 million tons, bulk cargoes amounted to 4.8 million tons.
AMPU emphasized the great importance of the agreement on the “grain initiative”, which allowed to unblock the work of ports “Big Odessa”, and if it were not for the actions of Russia, which blocks the “grain corridor”, the performance of the agreement could have been higher, the report said.
Administration specified that 614 vessels with 16 million tons of agricultural products for 40 countries have been sent for export within the framework of “grain initiative” since August 1. From the port of Odessa – 188 ships with 4.2 million tons, from the port of Chernomorsk – 261 vessels with 6.4 million tons, from Pivdenniy port – 165 vessels with 5.5 million tons.
One third of the vessels – 281 with 7.2 million tons of cargo was bound for Asia, and slightly less – 246 vessels with 6.8 million tons – for Europe, while 87 vessels with 2.1 million tons headed for Africa.
AMPU said that 2022 was planned as the year of the port infrastructure development, but the war has radically changed plans, and with the blocking of most Ukrainian ports, the administration focused on the development of transport logistics of the Danube region.
As a result, the volume of cargo handling in the port of Reni has grown to 6.82 million tons from 1.37 million tons in 2021, port Izmail – to 8.89 million tons from 4 million tons, Ust-Dunaysk – to 785 thousand tons from 64 thousand tons, which were the best results for all the years of Independence.
It was possible to achieve better results due to the development of public-private partnership and maximum business deregulation, the report says, as well as due to the dredging works, which were carried out for the first time in many years near the deep-water berths of Izmail and Reni. The total volume of operational dredging in port Izmail was 710 thousand cubic meters, in port Reni – 130 thousand cubic meters with a total volume of 280 thousand cubic meters, which is planned to be done until the end of II quarter of 2023. Dredging works were carried out by AMPU’s own forces with the participation of branch “Dredging fleet”.
AMPU noted that despite the fact that the Danube ports attracted all the available facilities for cargo handling, there is a potential for development in 2023. It will be realized by modernization of port infrastructure, construction of new terminals, continuation of dredging works and attraction of investments.
