Will Cunliffe
Research Analyst, The Officials
Q4 Quarterly Volumes Review
The Q4 volumes review is here alongside with the forecast for the quarters ahead
The Q4 volumes review is here alongside with the forecast for the quarters ahead
2025 was a record-breaking year, as global traded oil derivatives volumes exceeded 1 trillion barrels for the first time in history. The Officials present the Quarterly Volumes Review for Q4 2025. Q4 continued the broad-based fatigue that we documented in the prior Quarterly Volumes Review.
In this edition, we employ a hidden Markov switching model to segregate market state into three categories. We find that regimes remain persistent on average for 2-3 weeks, with the most persistent of the regimes being ‘Risk-on active’. The estimated transition structure indicates strong regime persistence. Such persistence was clearly demonstrated throughout H2 2025, as paralysis became entrenched. We find that 71.93% of trading days in Q4 were spent in the ‘paralysis’ regime. As a result, we observe significant weakness in traded volumes, which totalled just over 241 billion barrels.
The Officials publish outright values, spreads, cracks and boxes for the main energy commodities traded in the marketplace. The published values are determined independently and on a fair market basis by our team of dedicated professionals.
We invite you to read our reports, which are published twice a day, reflecting closing values at 16:30 Singapore time (SGT) and at 16:30 London time (GMT/BST). For any comments, please reach out to us through the emails provided in the signed documents.