Gasoline refining margins in northwest Europe softened slightly on Thursday as stocks built in Europe's Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp hub, but demand firm continued from West Africa. Oil product stocks independently in the Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp hub rose on the week to Thursday to hit 6.104 million tonnes, the highest since mid-May 2017, data from Dutch consultancy PJK International showed.
Gasoline stocks showed the biggest change, rising 10 percent to 1.159 million tonnes due to an increase in deliveries from Germany that counterbalanced high exports to west Africa, PJK's Lars van Wageningen said. Nigerian state oil company NNPC said it will import two cargoes of gasoline per day, totalling roughly 70,000 tonnes, for the rest of February in order to eradicate fuel queues in the shortage-hit nation
Already, there is a Suezmax of Baltic gasoline en route to Nigeria and a steady stream of additional cargoes. Traders said that buyers in the United States were also returning to the market after a period of relative quiet. While US stocks built in the week to last week, traders said buyers are now starting to build stocks of summer-grade fuels.
Vitol sold to Shell one eurobob barge in the afternoon window at $624 a tonne fob ARA. This compared with bid/offer discussions at $616-$626 a tonne on Wednesday. Earlier in the day, some 14,000 tonnes traded at $618.50-$622 a tonne fob Amsterdam-Rotterdam, down from $620-$634 a tonne on Wednesday. Varo, CCMA, BP and PetroIneos sold to Gunvor, with Hartree also purchasing one barge.
Varo and Statoil sold a total of 26 barges of premium unleaded gasoline to Total at $624 a tonne fob ARA, down from $638-$641 a tonne in the previous session. The March swap stood at $612.50 a tonne at the close, down from $622 a tonne. The benchmark EBOB gasoline refining margin slipped to $9.19 a barrel from $9.59 a barrel. Brent crude futures were 70 cents lower at $64.81 a barrel by 1701 GMT.