Sam Ikeotuonye, with agency reports
03 February 2019, Sweetcrude, Lagos — An unplanned outage in Libya and reduced exports from Algeria have combined to boost the potentials of Nigerian crude grades in the international market.
Nigerian crude differentials remained strong last week, while the high offer levels and a number of pending buy tenders were reportedly keeping some buyers on the sidelines.
A smaller export programme for Kazakhstan’s CPC Blend, as well as an Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, OPEC, led supply cut has helped to boost differentials for lighter West African grades, including Nigeria’s, according to Reuters.
Bonny Light and Qua Iboe were being offered around dated Brent plus $2.50, or at a premium of 90 cents to the official selling price, a trader said, steady from earlier in the week.
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No deals at that level were heard to have been done. Trade at that level would be the highest since 2014, Reuters reported, quoting Refinitiv Eikon data.
Meanwhile, less than half of the Angolan March loading programme, or about 18 cargoes, is available for sale on the spot market.
The heavier grades have not rallied as much as light, sweet grades. One trader said heavy grades were being offered at parity with dated Brent or at small premiums.
Also, Taiwanese refiner CPC has issued a tender to buy an unspecified amount of light, sweet crude that closes on Thursday. The company has taken an increasing amount of U.S. shale rather than West African crude over the last year.
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Indian Oil Corporation issued a buy tender for crude loading March 12-21. The tender closed on January 25.
Another Indian refiner, HPCL, is running a buy tender that could draw in West African crude. The tender closed last week.
