Fresh Niger Delta Attacks Could Send Oil Prices Up

The Niger Delta Avengers (NDA) were a major driver of the rally in oil markets over the past several months, as the outage of roughly 600,000 barrels per day helped push up crude oil prices. In June, a 30-day ceasefire between the NDA and the Nigerian government led to a few weeks of relative calm, and Nigeria’s oil minister said that the country was able to bring back a large chunk of the disrupted supply, bringing output up from 1.4 million barrels per day to 1.9 mb/d at the end of June, but still down from the 2.2 mb/d Nigeria produced before the vicious campaign began a few months ago.

But the ceasefire may already be over. According to local news reports, the Niger Delta Avengers struck new oil wells over the weekend, hitting two oil wells controlled by the oil major Chevron. “Preliminary investigations so far from our men in the field is that dynamite was used to blow up the facilities just like in previous attacks,” a source told THISDAY. The NDA also said on Twitter that it struck two major oil pipelines owned by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC). They were the first attacks since June 16