Asia distillates: Margins slip on excess supply
SINGAPORE (Reuters): Asian gasoil and jet fuel margins slipped on Monday as refineries returned from maintenance, adding to supply, while demand remained steady.
The gasoil crack for May slipped 30 cents to $16.47 a barrel over Dubai crude, while the jet fuel crack fell 32 cents to $16.79 a barrel, Reuters data showed.
Japan’s Cosmo Oil said on Saturday that it has restarted the 100,000 barrels-per-day (bpd) No. 1 Crude Distillation Unit (CDU) at its 220,000 bpd Chiba refinery, east of Tokyo.
This marks its first operations in more than 13 months after the facility was shut following the earthquake.
The return of the CDU unit and refineries from South Korea after planned maintenance in March, has added to a supply glut of jet fuel and low sulphur diesel, causing differentials to weaken, traders said.
China Aviation Oil has bought up to 1.4 million barrels of jet fuel at a discount of 40 cents a barrel to Singapore quotes, about 10 cents weaker than its previous spot cargoes, traders said. The cargoes could likely be loaded from North Asia, they added.
Sri Lanka’s Ceylon Petroleum Co (Ceypetco) emerged into the spot market seeking a prompt jet fuel and gasoil combination cargo for delivery in early May.
The prompt cargo was due to an unexpected shutdown of a jet-fuel producing unit at its 50,000 barrels-per-day refinery, a company source said on Monday.
Vietnam’s Military Petroleum Company (MPC) was heard to have bought 15,000 tonnes of 0.25 per cent sulphur gasoil for delivery into Hai Phong at a premium of $ 1.10 a barrel to Singapore benchmark quotes. The seller could not be confirmed, but could likely be Unipec, a trader said.
In Thailand, PTT has sold 15,000 tonnes of 500 ppm sulphur gasoil and 20,000 tonnes of jet fuel for loading over 7-10 May to Chevron. The price was not known.
India’s Bharat Petroleum Corp (BPCL) has bought a combination 340 ppm sulphur gasoil cargo totalling 35,000 tonnes for delivery into Paradip and Haldia from Shell at a premium of $ 7 a barrel to Middle East quotes.
Pakistan State Oil’s purchase tender for jet fuel, which closed last week and is to be awarded on 5 May, had Vitol and Total place the best offers for May and June cargoes at premiums of $ 4.69 per barrel and $ 4.32 per barrel over Middle East quotes, respectively.
In Singapore, a rare Middle East loading cargo traded on Monday, with BP hitting a Vitol offer for 100,000 barrels of jet fuel for loading in mid-May.
“It could be part of Tasweeq’s term cargo, no surprise to see the lower premium for the jet fuel cargo as regrade is weak and the arbitrage to send cargoes to Europe is not workable,” said a Gulf-based trader.
