Middle East crude benchmarks Oman and Dubai advanced for a third consecutive session as the market expects tightening crude supply from the OPEC+ group from May when they start the additional output reduction.
Analysts from Energy Aspects expected some Chinese and South Korean refiners have nominated 450,000 barrels-per-day (bpd) less of crude oil supply from Saudi Aramco in May than their contractual volume.
Aramco may also choose to lower oil throughput at its domestic refineries to limit the amounts by which they must cut crude exports, the analysts said.
Saudi Arabia plans to cut an extra of 500,000 bpd of crude production from May to the rest of the year. The top oil exporter was reported to supply full nominated volume to clients.
OSP
Kuwait raised the official selling price (OSP) for Kuwait Export Crude (KEC) to Asia in May by 25 cents from the previous month to $2.40 a barrel above the average of Oman/Dubai quotes, a price document reviewed by Reuters showed on Wednesday.
The producer set the May Kuwait Super Light Crude (KSLC) OSP at $2.50 a barrel above Oman/Dubai quotes, 10 cents lower than the previous month.
SINGAPORE CASH DEALS
Cash Dubai’s premium to swaps edged up by 5 cents to $2.08 a barrel.
NEWS
Non-OPEC countries will account for a higher percentage of oil production gains this year and next, a reversal of the last two years, the U.S. Energy Information Administration predicted on Tuesday.
Italy gave conditional approval on Tuesday to the sale of the Lukoil-owned refinery LKOH in Sicily to Cypriot private equity firm G.O.I. Energy, people familiar with the matter told Reuters.
Russia started fuel exports to Iran by rail this year for the first time after traditional buyers shunned trade with Moscow, according to three industry sources and exports data.
Russia’s government has approved the sale of Shell’s SHEL former 27.5% stake in the Sakhalin-2 energy project to Russian energy firm Novatek NVTK for 94.8 billion roubles ($1.16 billion), a government order showed on Wednesday.
Source: Reuters