Middle East Crude

　A resumption of Middle Eastern crude supplies from the Persian Gulf was proceeding, while players led by majors were working on moving Middle Eastern cargoes to outside Asia such as Europe. The benchmark Brent/Dubai spreads were widening in favor of Brent, so that moving Dubai based Middle Eastern crudes to Europe was seen profitable. In fact, since last week, Italian ENI placed Upper Zakum and French TotalEnergies placed Murban, each 2.0 million barrels, to Europe. A Chinese company says, "Since late last week, volumes of about five VLCCs of Middle Eastern crudes have apparently flowed to Europe." Meanwhile, Dangote group in Nigeria was said to have procured Abu Dhabi Umm Lulu and Das via private negotiations.

African/European/Russian/American Crude

　 In trade for Russian crude, talks for Urals for August-arrival in India started. Some sellers offered Urals for August arrival at discounts of $5.00 to Dated Brent. However, buying interest remained weak at present. End-users such as India's state-owned Indian Oil Corp (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corp (BPCL), Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals (MRPL), HPCL-Mittal Energy (HMEL), and India's Reliance Industries (RIL) showed little interest in buying at these levels. Amid increasing supplies from Middle Eastern crude producers, such as state-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Co (ADNOC) actively selling spot sales, Indian end-users sensed that the market for Urals had room to move down and were not in a hurry to purchase. "Compared to the awarded prices in ADNOC's recent sell tenders, current offers for Urals are overvalued. Therefore, sellers will need to lower their offers," an Indian end-user noted.

Asia Pacific Crude

　 Bangchak Petroleum purchased one cargo of Champion for Aug 15-17 loading from European Glencore as reported. It later turned out that Bangchak purchased another cargo for August-loading Champion, apart from the above cargo. In the August-loading trading cycle as mentioned above, three spot cargoes emerged. Market sources said Brunei's crude oil exports would total 3.60 million barrels, up about 600,000bbl from normal months. Meanwhile, ExxonMobil still had a total of two August-loading Tapis cargoes unsold. A trader in Singapore said ExxonMobil appeared to have surplus Tapis cargoes after reducing run rates at its 605,000 b/d Jurong refinery in Singapore. However, trade for August loading is entering its final stage, making it difficult to find active buyers.