Bunker prices have mostly tracked declining Brent values across the Americas, and LSMGO stems have been offered in a wide range in Los Angeles.
Changes on the day to 09.30 CST (14.30 GMT) today:
- VLSFO prices steady in Balboa, and down in Los Angeles ($5/mt), Houston ($4/mt) and New York and Zona Comun ($1/mt)
- LSMGO prices steady in New York, and down in Houston ($6/mt), Zona Comun ($5/mt), Los Angeles ($4/mt) and Balboa ($2/mt)
- HSFO380 prices down in Los Angeles ($49/mt), Rotterdam ($4/mt), New York and Balboa ($3/mt)
Los Angeles’ HSFO380 price has slumped to wide discounts to other regional ports after it was offered at significantly lower levels yesterday. Price offers can vary greatly between suppliers, depending on whether they seek to move volume or go for margins.
Supply of the grade has been steady in Los Angeles, while nearby San Francisco has had more limited availability for prompt dates. A supplier’s earliest delivery date is around 8-9 days out in San Francisco.
LSMGO is also tight in San Francisco, with one supplier running low on product and others pricing the grade at high premiums.
Brent
Front-month ICE Brent has dropped further, trading $0.80/bbl lower at 09.30 CST (14.30 GMT) today than a day earlier.
Commercial US crude oil stocks grew by 4.27 million bbls in the week to 22 October, Energy Information Administration (EIA) figures showed today.
That was more than the 1.90 million-bbl build expected by analysts polled by Reuters, and sent Brent down by almost $1/bbl in the 15 minutes after the weekly figures came out at 14.30 GMT today.
Gasoline and distillate stockpiles, meanwhile, shrank despite higher production levels. The draw for gasoline was sizeable at 1.99 million bbls, pointing to strong road fuels demand.
Brent started the day trading above $86/bbl, and near multi-year highs, after Saudi Aramco yesterday warned of a larger oil supply deficit if Covid-19 concerns wither and more people fly again next year. Its chief executive Amin Nasser told Bloomberg that “spare capacity is shrinking”.
“It’s now getting to a situation where there’s limited supply — whatever is left that’s spare is declining rapidly.”
In its latest forecast, OPEC+ estimated that the global supply-demand balance will swing to a surplus from next year. The group has so far been unwilling to phase back oil supply cuts it made last year at a faster pace than 400,000 b/d per month, despite calls to pump more to curb the recent price rally.