Asia’s gasoline margins held steady on Thursday, as the day saw 350,000 barrels of the benchmark grade of octane exchanging hands.

The margins held at $9.57 per barrel over Brent crude.

In naphtha, the margins climbed to a month’s high to settle at $96.28 per metric ton over Brent crude, it highest since Nov. 12.

The backwardation between second-half January and second-half February widened to $6.25.

NEWS

Singapore’s light distillate stocks rose by 1.357 million barrels to a 14-week high of 15.392 million barrels in the week ending Dec. 11, data from Enterprise SG showed. O/SING

Oil prices were little changed on Thursday as forecasts of weak demand and a higher-than-expected rise in U.S. gasoline and distillate inventories placed a lid on gains from an additional round of EU sanctions threatening Russian oil flows.

The world oil market will be comfortably supplied in 2025, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Thursday, even after OPEC+ extended oil supply cuts and a slightly higher than expected demand forecast.

SINGAPORE CASH DEALS O/AS

Four gasoline deals and no naphtha trade.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Haridas; Editing by Sonia Cheema)