The Oil Man: Oil price, Cairn Energy/FAR, Petroceltic

WTI $39.72 +$2.46, Brent $41.94 +$2.51, Diff $2.22 +5c, NG $1.99 -3c

Right at the last on Friday, the bulls took strong charge as a bunch of technical factors helped sway the market upwards. WTI ended the week up $2.93 and Brent $3.27 only a touch more than Friday's rise.

With only six days to go until the Doha meeting, there are various reports and speeches to be watched out for. The Russian oil minister started the ball rolling by suggesting that the start date of the freeze may be a moveable feast - perhaps not January, maybe April?

There are many other questions, mainly centering around Iran's position and whether they get a free ride to 4 million barrels per day, Libya's production (if it can ever get back on its feet) and, of course, how far the Saudis let all this go - after all, the higher price at the moment comes with a commensurate increase in optimism in the US.

It is worth reading Dan Yergin's interview in the Financial Times today; I tend to share his view on OPEC - as I have said for some time, the Saudi stance was to take out all higher-cost crude oil, in or out of OPEC…

The rig count helped a bit; overall the number was down seven at 443 units, while oil was down eight at 354 units. And this week sees the Energy Information Administration, OPEC and the International Energy Agency all produce their monthly reports; these and the inventory stats will shape the market more than usual.

The blog may be intermittent for the next 48 hours, as I am away with a group in Gdansk…

Cairn/FAR

Cairn has announced this morning that the BEL-1 exploration well offshore Senegal discovered what is probably non-commercial gas but - much more importantly - excellent oil reservoirs which confirm the northern extension of the SNE field.

The well found a circa-100-metre gross oil column similar in all respects to SNEs one, two and three, which can only be a good thing for 2C resource estimates; the field is being de-risked with every well.

This well was always going to be a gas risk, as a frontier exploration target in this area would be, but there are a number of interesting takeaways from the process. Firstly there must be a chance of associated liquids (albeit of modest potential added value) but, secondly and more importantly, there is a strong possibility of oil down dip, which could enhance resource numbers quite substantially.

I confidently expect these estimates to rise and, if I had any doubts before about this being commercial, they are no longer of consequence. WoodMack is right, this is a world-class discovery.

The Joint Venture (JV) is now moving on to drill another well, SNE-4, which has been made possible by the speed and efficiency of the operating crew up until now. This should come as no surprise; I flagged it up after SNE-2, as the third well was going so well and the JV was well below budget.

There have been some comments as to whether FAR will raise any more money at this stage, given another well is being drilled. Whilst I am confident that they are well within budget, it may well be prudent, with so much good news and potential upside around, to take advantage and tap the market - then, of course, they might reveal more up-to-date resource estimates…

Both Cairn and FAR remain key members of the bucket list - despite excellent performance so far this year, the best is yet to come…

Petroceltic

The company advises that the examiner has been appointed and will listen to all potential intentions of interest for the assets in the next few weeks.

Whilst it would seem that Worldview are front and centre in this process, owning large slugs of both debt and equity, there is no certainty that they will take the assets over.

I have to say that it would be quite interesting to see them on the ground in an operating environment; maybe they would be slightly less critical then…

And finally…

As promised, the weekend of sport really did live up to pre-match expectations.

Leicester continue to frustrate Spurs and now only need three more victories to win the title.

Elsewhere, the best game was the three-three between the Hammers and the Gooners, with the former yet again getting an awful, key decision against them.

At the bottom, the Eagles secured their first win this year against the Canaries, who also got a poor decision against them. With the Maccams and the Magpies both losing, all is still to play for…

The boxing was short but sweet; Anthony Joshua just stopping his hysterical laughter at "Prince Charles" Martin entering the ring with a crown on in time to do him in round two. If AJ fights on 9 July, when Fury is on, who will people watch?

The Grand National changed dramatically, as a week's worth of rain fell in an hour or so before the start; only 12 finished and it became the lottery that it used to be.

If you follow the Golden State Warriors then it's a nervy 36 hours or so - beating the Spurs last night means they have equalled the record and can beat it in their last game tomorrow night.

And, saving the best till last: how many people didn't stay up for the Masters as Jordan Spieth was five ahead with nine holes to play?

This morning dawned with the first British winner for 20 years, as Danny Willett took advantage of the leader spending time in the oggin to cruise past and claim the green jacket.

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