Asia’s spot fuel oil market was little changed on Thursday amid thin trade, while onshore inventories at Singapore fell for a second straight week to one-month lows.
Inventories continued to draw as selling pressure persisted amid a steeply backwardated market, while imports also fell week-on-week, Enterprise Singapore data showed.
Meanwhile, Kuwait Petroleum Corp has awarded its term tender for very low sulphur fuel oil (VLSFO) to an oil major, at a discount of $7 to $8 per metric ton to Singapore cargo quotes on a free-on-board (FOB) Kuwait basis, market sources said.
The Singapore cash premium for 0.5% VLSFO MFO05-SIN-DIF held steady at about $28.25 a metric ton on Thursday, while refining margin LFO05SGDUBCMc1 extended gains to a premium of $13.13 a barrel.
Spot high sulphur fuel oil (HSFO) cash differentials FO380-SIN-DIF slipped amid a lower offer, though 380-cst HSFO margin FO380DUBCKMc1 inched higher to a discount of $12.30 a barrel.
SINGAPORE INVENTORIES O/SING1
Onshore fuel oil inventories STKRS-SIN fell 5% to 18.55 million barrels (2.92 million tons) in the week ended Nov. 8, data from Enterprise Singapore showed.
Net imports, calculated by subtracting total exports from total imports, fell by more than five times week-on-week to 233,490 tons, based on the Enterprise Singapore data.
OTHER NEWS
– Oil prices steadied on Thursday as markets shrugged off deflationary indicators in China and looked for further clues on the status of demand from the world’s two biggest oil consumers.
– Global energy trader Gunvor is exiting fuel oil storage at the Oiltanking Seraya terminal in the Asian oil hub of Singapore, with a Sinopec unit set to take over the space, several market sources told Reuters.
– The government of Shandong province, China’s independent refinery hub, has asked Beijing for an extra 3 million metric tons of fuel oil import quotas for the rest of 2023 to enable plants to raise output amid a shortage of crude oil quotas, trading sources and a consultancy said
– India saved roughly $2.7 billion by importing discounted Russian oil in the first nine months of this year, according to calculations based on government data, helping it support economic growth and easing pressure on its trade deficit.
WINDOW TRADES O/AS
– 180-cst HSFO: No trade
– 380-cst HSFO: No trade
– 0.5% VLSFO: No trade
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Jeslyn Lerh; Editing by Shailesh Kuber)