- Oil edges slightly higher after Russia relaxes its fuel export ban
- November ’23 WTI gained 13c this morning to trade around $90.16/Bbl
- Crude prices held on to weekly gains on Friday, as the Fed hinted at another potential rate hike and the expected supply constraints from Saudi and Russian output cuts
- Adding to the supply constraints, U.S. oil refiners are set to have 1.7 MMBbl/d of capacity offline for the week ending Sept 29, reducing refining capacity by 0.32 MMBbl/d (Reuters, IIR Energy)
- The offline capacity is anticipated to increase to 1.9 MMBbl/d by October 6, IIR noted
- Additionally, within the CFTC's managed money category, both net-long and long-only positions for NYMEX WTI oil have hit their highest in 19 months, further indicating bullish sentiment
- However, the US dollar hit its highest level since November, making dollar-denominated commodities more expensive
- Russia lifts the export ban on low-quality diesel (Bloomberg)
- Russia amended its fuel export ban issued last week, lifting the temporary ban on bunker fuel, gas oils, and some middle distillates. However, the ban on most diesel and gasoline exports remains in place
- Russia, the largest seaborne diesel-type fuel exporter, has halted diesel and gasoline exports from Sept 21 with no clear end date to control surging domestic fuel prices
- Preceding the export ban, diesel exports in the first 20 days of September fell by 28% to about 65,700 tons, compared to an average of 91,800 tons in August, likely due to seasonal maintenance
- However, Moscow faces capacity constraints as diesel storage reached 22 MMBbl by September 18, with a maximum estimated capacity of 27.7 MMBbl