Asia’s gasoline margins picked up on Wednesday after falling in the previous session.
SKEISG was the biggest buyer at the end of the closing window, snapping up 300,000 barrels of the benchmark grade octane.
The crack inched higher to $4.93 per barrel above Brent crude, from $4.89 on Tuesday.
Discussing the margins in the gasoline market, a trader painted a bleak outlook for gasoline margins in the short term, with demand from China set to remain weak. China’s shift in focus to electric vehicles and clean energy is expected to further affect gasoline margins, he added.
In naphtha, the crack rose by $3.42 to $97.60 per metric ton over Brent crude.
NEWS
Oil climbed more than 1% on Wednesday, as a drop in U.S. crude inventories and concern about Hurricane Francine disrupting U.S. output countered concerns about weak global demand. Brent crude futures LCOc1 were up $1.10 to $70.29 a barrel. U.S. crude futures CLc1 gained $1.11 to $66.86.
One of the United States’ largest refineries was cutting back production on Tuesday as Hurricane Francine was forecast to pass just east of its location. Exxon plans to cut production to as low as 20% of the Baton Rouge refinery’s 522,500 barrel-per-day (bpd) capacity by Wednesday.
INVENTORIES
U.S. crude stocks fell by 2.793 million barrels, gasoline declined by 513,000 barrels and distillates inventories rose by 191,000 barrels, according to market sources citing the latest week’s American Petroleum Institute figures on Tuesday.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Haridas; Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala)