Northwest European gasoline profit margins rose slightly on Friday to $14.54 a barrel on brisk trading activity and lower regional inventories.

A total of 16,500 metric tons of Eurobob E5 barges traded in the Argus window on Friday, an increase of more than twofold on the previous session. Gunvor and Trafigura sold barges to Shell, BP, Varo, Aramco, TotalEnergies and Mabanaft.

No Eurobob E10 barges traded.

Gasoline stocks independently held in the Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp (ARA) refining and storage hub fell 6% to 1.21 million metric tons in the week to May 15 on higher seaborne exports to the Americas and firmer demand from inland locations, Insights Global data showed.

U.S. oil refiners are expected to have about 717,000 barrels per day (bpd) of capacity offline in the week ending May 16, increasing available refining capacity by 562,000 bpd, research company IIR Energy said on Friday.

Meanwhile, EU and UK gasoline and blending component exports to other regions are expected to reach 756,000 bpd in May, compared with 1.09 million bpd in April, Kpler data showed.
Source: Reuters