Latest news with #Kpler
Reuters
a day ago
- Business
- Reuters
Huge tanker with Russian ESPO oil waits near China as demand sags
MOSCOW, May 30 (Reuters) - The Big Star, a huge tanker with 2.1 million barrels of Russia's ESPO Blend oil onboard, has been waiting near China in a potential sign of weaker demand for the crude in the region, LSEG data showed and two traders said on Friday. Many state oil companies in China are wary of potential secondary sanctions from the United States if they buy the sanctions-hit Russian oil, traders said. China's seaborne oil imports from Russia dropped to the lowest in 26 months in February, with commodity analysts Kpler assessing arrivals at 970,000 barrels per day. Since then, they have recovered as demand from private "teapot" refiners picked up. But obstacles to Russia's oil trade remain. The Big Star - a so-called very large crude carrier (VLCC) - loaded a total of 2.1 million barrels of ESPO blend from three smaller Aframax tankers, Leftkada, Kai Fu and Centurion I, between May 12 and May 17 near Russia's Far East port of Zarubino, LSEG and Kpler data showed, and headed towards Jieyang in China's southern Guangdong province before stopping. One of the traders suggested the three cargoes were placed too late for sale and failed to attract buyers. Oil in Asian markets normally sells one and a half months prior to loading. The three cargoes loaded from Kozmino port in late April and early in May, prior to the ship-to-ship transfer to the Big Star, LSEG data showed. It is not common for ESPO tankers to be involved in ship-to-ship transfers given the proximity of Russia's Kozmino port to China, and it is also rare for the grade to be held in floating storage, the traders said. After May 23, the vessel briefly lost a ship-tracking signal and then emerged near the Senkaku Islands, not far from Taiwan, on May 25, but has remained anchored since, according to LSEG data.
The Star
a day ago
- Business
- The Star
Oil tankers going dark off Malaysia as Iran trade draws scrutiny
SOUTH-EAST ASIA (Bloomberg): Tankers involved in a vital hub of the Iran-to-China oil trade are disappearing from digital tracking systems, as the threat of US sanctions forces tactical changes to keep crude flowing. Over recent months, more vessels have started switching off their transponders as they near waters off eastern Malaysia, a hotspot for the transfer of Iranian oil from one to ship to another for transport to China. Previously, systems were rarely disabled, signaling when tankers anchored next to each other. While the tactic of going dark is not new, it's being used more regularly off Malaysia to avoid scrutiny. The White House says the Iranian oil trade generates revenue that supports Tehran-backed militia groups including Hamas, and has sought to hobble flows through sanctions on ships, ports and refiners. "Ship-to-ship transfers have been used to mask the origin of those cargoes,' said Muyu Xu, a senior crude oil analyst at Kpler in Singapore. "Now they're switching signals off for longer, so that it's now even harder trace those flows back to the source, which is Iran.' A recent example is the Vani, an unsanctioned very large crude carrier that was built in 2004 and has the capacity to carry 2 million barrels. The empty vessel signaled its position off eastern Malaysia on May 15, before going dark then and reappearing fully laden in the region five days later, according to ship-tracking compiled by Bloomberg. While Vani was missing from digital tracking systems, the tanker conducted a ship-to-ship transfer on May 18 with the Nora, a US-sanctioned vessel that had collected Iranian crude from the Kharg Island export terminal, according to Kpler and Vortexa. Vani is now signaling Qingdao in China as its destination, data from the two analytics companies show. Avani Lines Inc., based in the Marshall Islands and the registered owner of Vani, doesn't have a listed phone number or email address for contact on the Maritime Portal run by S&P Global Inc. China's independent refiners are the biggest buyers of Iranian crude, attracted to the discounted barrels because they help buffer typically razor thin margins. While official Chinese data shows the nation hasn't imported oil from the OPEC producer since 2022, third-party figures signal robust flows. China imported around 1.46 million barrels a day from Iran last month, down from a five-month high in March, according to Kpler. Flows started to slip late last year but have since recovered. Other methods being used to keep the Iran-to-China trade in business include the use of zombie ships - vessels that take on the identities of scrapped tankers to appear legitimate. In April, at least six ship-to-ship transfers off Malaysia were conducted with vessels that had disabled their transponders, including one with the Celine, a US-sanctioned ship, that had loaded Iranian oil from Kharg Island, according to Kpler. In the same month last year, only one tanker went dark. Ships can be identified conducting oil transfers by analyzing satellite imagery, but the process is labor intensive and picture quality depends on the weather. It requires matching tankers to photos of vessels with known identities, a method that needs more time and can be prone to human error. "It's getting more and more difficult to track those sanctioned flows,' Emma Li, senior market analyst at intelligence firm Vortexa Ltd., said during a client presentation in Singapore in early April attended by Bloomberg News. -- ©2025 Bloomberg L.P.
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Business Standard
a day ago
- Business
- Business Standard
India's May diesel exports to SE Asia hit multi-year high on strong margins
Increased diesel from India, one of the largest suppliers in the region, is cooling spot premiums for the fuel in Asia Reuters India's diesel exports to Southeast Asia for May are set to hit the highest in at least four years, according to shiptrackers and three trade sources, as traders eyed higher profits in Asia while higher freight costs deterred shipments to Europe. Increased diesel from India, one of the largest suppliers in the region, is cooling spot premiums for the fuel in Asia and pressuring derivatives markets, while tightening the fuel's availability in Europe and supporting prices there. Shipments on the India-Southeast Asia route climbed to 600,000 metric tons (4.47 million barrels) or more this month, shiptracking data from LSEG, Kpler, Vortexa and two trade sources showed. Such levels were last seen at the end of 2021, Kpler data showed. Most volumes were destined for Singapore or Malaysia, the data showed. Meanwhile, Indian diesel bound for Europe in May was estimated at 500,000 tons, LSEG data showed. "The re-direction of Indian diesel barrels east has had a two-fold effect," said Sparta Commodities analyst James Noel-Beswick. "First, it has flooded the Singapore market, leading to a swift rebound in local inventories and applying downward pressure on diesel spreads since late April," he said. For Europe, the drop in Indian supplies has prompted June ICE gasoil prices to rise, he added. Asian cash premiums for 10-ppm sulphur diesel fell to seven-week lows of 20 cents per barrel early this week while refining margins have been struggling to hold above $16 per barrel, LSEG data showed. ARBITRAGE The average discounts for the east-west price spread for April and May were at $22 and $20 per ton, respectively, LSEG data showed, with traders saying such levels were slightly more profitable for sellers to sell east instead of west. Lower shipping costs also helped push more Indian supply to Southeast Asia, they added. Cost for chartering a medium-range vessel carrying 40,000 tons of diesel on the India-Northwest Europe route jumped to $2.35 million in the past week, equivalent to $59 per ton, up from $2.05 million last month, SSY Tanker data on LSEG Workspace showed. In comparison, shipping fees for a similarly-sized vessel on the India-Singapore route were less than $1 million, the data added. India's diesel production also rose in May after Reliance Industries restarted a crude unit at the Jamnagar refinery, leading to more exports, said Vortexa's head of APAC analysis Ivan Mathews. Next month, India will probably export more diesel as local demand is set to fall during the monsoon season, two Singapore-based trade sources said. One of them estimated that demand could drop by 500,000 tons or more.
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First Post
a day ago
- Business
- First Post
India's May diesel exports to SE Asia hit multi-year high on higher margins
India's diesel exports to Southeast Asia in May will hit a four-year high, cooling spot premiums and pressuring derivatives markets. Shipments reached 600,000 metric tons. read more India's diesel exports to Southeast Asia for May are set to hit the highest in at least four years, according to shiptrackers and three trade sources, as traders eyed higher profits in Asia while higher freight costs deterred shipments to Europe. Increased diesel from India, one of the largest suppliers in the region, is cooling spot premiums for the fuel in Asia and pressuring derivatives markets, while tightening the fuel's availability in Europe and supporting prices there. Shipments on the India-Southeast Asia route climbed to 600,000 metric tons (4.47 million barrels) or more this month, shiptracking data from LSEG, Kpler, Vortexa and two trade sources showed. Such levels were last seen at the end of 2021, Kpler data showed. Most volumes were destined for Singapore or Malaysia, the data showed. Meanwhile, Indian diesel bound for Europe in May was estimated at 500,000 tons, LSEG data showed. 'The re-direction of Indian diesel barrels east has had a two-fold effect,' said Sparta Commodities analyst James Noel-Beswick. 'First, it has flooded the Singapore market, leading to a swift rebound in local inventories and applying downward pressure on diesel spreads since late April,' he said. For Europe, the drop in Indian supplies has prompted June ICE gasoil prices to rise, he added. Asian cash premiums for 10-ppm sulphur diesel fell to seven-week lows of 20 cents per barrel early this week while refining margins have been struggling to hold above $16 per barrel, LSEG data showed. ARBITRAGE The average discounts for the east-west price spread for April and May were at $22 and $20 per ton, respectively, LSEG data showed, with traders saying such levels were slightly more profitable for sellers to sell east instead of west. Lower shipping costs also helped push more Indian supply to Southeast Asia, they added. Cost for chartering a medium-range vessel carrying 40,000 tons of diesel on the India-Northwest Europe route jumped to $2.35 million in the past week, equivalent to $59 per ton, up from $2.05 million last month, SSY Tanker data on LSEG Workspace showed. In comparison, shipping fees for a similarly-sized vessel on the India-Singapore route were less than $1 million, the data added. India's diesel production also rose in May after Reliance Industries restarted a crude unit at the Jamnagar refinery, leading to more exports, said Vortexa's head of APAC analysis Ivan Mathews. Next month, India will probably export more diesel as local demand is set to fall during the monsoon season, two Singapore-based trade sources said. One of them estimated that demand could drop by 500,000 tons or more. (Except headline, this story has not been edited by Firstpost staff)
Reuters
a day ago
- Business
- Reuters
Natural gas bulls should bemoan Indonesia's coal export blues: Maguire
LITTLETON, Colorado, May 30 (Reuters) - Developers and exporters of natural gas should be alarmed by the dour state of thermal coal exports coming out of Indonesia. The world's largest thermal coal exporter is on course for a rare decline in annual sales after shipping out the smallest tonnage in three years during the opening five months of 2025. To combat declining sales, regional coal traders have cut export prices to their lowest in four years, which in turn are reducing the cost of coal-fired power production across Asia. That's bad news for natural gas bulls, who eye Asia as their main potential growth market but are already struggling to displace cheaper coal from power systems across the region. Indonesian coal sales to the two largest coal consumers - China and India - dropped by 23% and 14% respectively so far this year as coal miners in those countries lifted domestic output and reduced demand for imports. Indonesia exported just under 188 million metric tons of coal used for power generation during January to May, according to commodities trade intelligence firm Kpler. That total was 12% or around 25 million tons less than during the same months in 2024, and was the lowest for that period since 2022. Sales to top market China are down by 23% or by 20 million tons compared to January to May 2024, while sales to India were 14% or 6.5 million tons lower. As China and India have historically accounted for two-thirds of all Indonesian coal exports, exporters are attempting to replace those lost volumes with sales to other markets. However, the soft state of global consumer demand and manufacturing activity has also cooled demand for industrial power fuels in other major coal import markets, including South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and the Philippines. Indeed, eight of the ten largest markets for Indonesian coal have registered year-over-year declines in imports so far in 2025. To combat the declining sales, coal traders in Indonesia, Australia, Colombia, South Africa and Russia have all cut prices this month, with many key international coal benchmarks currently trading at over four-year lows. As Asia's power system already relies on coal for over half of all electricity supplies, cheaper coal prices look set to deepen the region's reliance on the fuel for power, especially while economic and business profit growth remain subdued. Cheaper coal prices also serve to undermine the appeal of constructing new natural gas-fired power plants in the region, especially in areas where new solar capacity can be brought online more quickly to help boost near-term power supplies. Natural gas plants currently produce around 10% of Asia's utility-supplied electricity, according to Ember, fed by around 912 gigawatts (GW) of regional gas-fired generation capacity, data from Global Energy Monitor (GEM) shows. Gas market bulls have high hopes that more gas generation capacity will be built in Asia. Two-thirds of all new global gas power capacity currently under construction is taking place within the continent, GEM data shows. An additional 61% of gas projects in so-called pre-construction - where deals have been proposed but capital and sites have yet to be secured - are also in Asia. Most, if not all, of the gas projects currently under construction are expected to come online, especially the roughly 53 GW of new capacity in China and Taiwan where outdated coal-fired capacity is expected to be replaced by newer gas plants. Singapore and South Korea have a further 7 GW in the construction phase, which should bode well for international gas export potential as both those countries are gas importers. However, it is not yet clear how much more gas generation capacity will be built elsewhere in Asia, especially in countries such as Indonesia and the Philippines where there are limited government funds available for large energy investments. Both Indonesia and the Philippines have also been hit by gas project delays in recent years which are serving to undermine commercial support for new gas projects, especially when solar capacity has been brought online more quickly. The speed of cost reductions of solar generation and battery storage systems also cloud the outlook for gas power projects that are not yet under construction, especially in countries with strong social support for reducing fossil fuel reliance. For exporters of natural gas and LNG, the combination of project delays and development uncertainty is already serving to postpone potential export volume growth by years and is placing pressure on near-term LNG export prices in key markets. And with coal prices now lingering near multi-year lows, that could be enough to change the tune of many gas market bulls. The opinions expressed here are those of the author, a columnist for Reuters.
