- US demand for motor fuel is increasing as travel returns to pre-pandemic levels and the driving season approaches
- US imports of the gasoline from Europe hit a six-month high in the seven days leading up to May 19, according to ship-tracking data
- Flows to the US East Coast from Europe will reach 487 MBbl/d this month, the most since May 2019, according to Vortexa
- Meanwhile, U.S. gasoline inventories have fallen for seven consecutive weeks, to 220.2 MMBbls, the lowest since December
- The White House is reportedly considering using the Northeast Home Heating Oil Stockpile, a little-used emergency diesel reserve, to alleviate a supply shortage
- The reserve has a stockpile of 1 MMBbls of ultra-low sulfur distillates that were built in 2000 but only utilized once, during Hurricane Sandy in 2012
- Last Monday, the national average price of diesel reached a new high of $5.58/gal, and two weeks ago US distillate stockpiles fell to their lowest level since 2005
- Russia's state-owned oil company Rosneft has seen the biggest reduction in production since the invasion of Ukraine (BBG)
- Rosneft and its subsidiaries are responsible for around two-thirds of Russia's production cuts since the invasion of Ukraine, as per the data from the Russian Energy Ministry
- Russian oil output in mid-May was 830 MBbl/d lower than in February, according to statistics from the Energy Ministry's CDU-TEK unit