Europe & Africa Market Update 10 Nov

Bunker prices in major European and African ports have dropped sharply, while prompt fuel availability is tight in the ARA ports.

IMAGE: The Europoort area in the Port of Rotterdam. Getty Images

Changes on the day to 09.00 GMT today:

• VLSFO prices down in Rotterdam ($37/mt), Durban ($33/mt) and Gibraltar ($29/mt)
• LSMGO prices down in Rotterdam ($146/mt), Durban ($101/mt) and Gibraltar ($77/mt)
• HSFO prices down in Durban ($50/mt), Gibraltar ($39/mt) and Rotterdam ($32/mt)
• B30-VLSFO price up in Rotterdam ($24/mt)

Rotterdam’s LSMGO price has dropped nearly twice as much as Gibraltar’s. A lower-priced, 50-150 mt stem, fixed in the Dutch port at $1,255/mt, has put additional downward pressure on the benchmark.

This has widened Rotterdam’s price discount to Gibraltar’s LSMGO by $69/mt in a single day.

The steep fall has also pushed Rotterdam’s LSMGO price below the port's B100, with the latter now costing about $31/mt more. B100’s sharp discount to LSMGO had boosted its demand at the port earlier, market participants observed.

Fuel availability of LSMGO, VLSFO and HSFO is tight for prompt delivery dates, and buyers are advised lead times between 5-7 days to get good coverage from suppliers, a trader told ENGINE.

Brent:

The front-month ICE Brent contract has fallen by $5.95/bbl on the day, to trade at $90.59/bbl at 09.00 GMT.

Upward pressure:

Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Energy confirmed an attack on the country’s East-West oil pipeline in the Medina region on 9 November. The pipeline allows Saudi Arabia to export crude oil via the Red Sea, bypassing the Strait of Hormuz.

“Oil’s political sell-off masks a dangerous reality,” Kpler’s head of Middle East and OPEC+ insights, Amena Bakr, wrote in an opinion piece for Arabian Gulf Business Insight.

Despite the price decline, threats to the Middle East’s energy infrastructure, shipping routes and crude exports from the Gulf remain unchanged, Bakr noted.

Iran has ruled out transferring enriched uranium out of the country, state-owned news agency IRNA reported, citing Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei. His comments follow a report by Saudi-owned Al Arabiya that a Qatari-Pakistani mediation proposal had revived negotiations around Iran’s nuclear program.

Downward pressure:

US President Donald Trump has suggested that the US-Israel war with Iran could end soon.

“... they are talking to us. And they are talking very politely. And we’ll see what happens. But there’s a good chance that that could get ended,” Trump said in a media briefing following talks with Qatar’s prime minister in Washington, DC.

Prospects of de-escalation and renewed diplomatic efforts over Iran’s nuclear programme have put downward pressure on Brent’s price, which has fallen around 15% over the past week, down $15.83/bbl, from $106.42/bbl.

By Nachiket Tekawade and Konica Bhatt

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