SINGAPORE: Oman continued to weaken in the Middle East crude market on Friday, weighed down by a supply glut and poor demand from refiners entering maintenance season.
Spot differentials for Qatar Marine may come under pressure after the Gulf Arab state set the official selling price (OSP) for the grade largely unchanged against Dubai crude.
Qatar set its December retroactive OSP for its Marine crude at $58.25 a barrel. The price puts the discount for Qatar Marine to Dubai crude at $2 a barrel, down 2 cents from the previous month.
Earlier this week, ADNOC lowered the differential for Upper Zakum, a grade of similar quality, against Dubai crude by 76 cents a barrel.
Qatar set its December Qatar Land crude OSP at $60.25, down $15.95 from the previous month. That puts the grade flat against Dubai crude, up 13 cents from last month.
Shell bought 3 million barrels of Oman crude for February-loading from the country's oil and gas ministry, according to traders. The price was not known.
South Korea's KNOC also bought 2 million barrels of Oman crude for arrival in February and March, traders said. The purchase was part of a swap deal, in which the company sold similar volumes loaded in October and November, they said.
Saudi Arabia and its Gulf OPEC allies are showing no sign of considering cutting output to boost oil prices, even though they dipped below $50 a barrel this week.
DME OMAN
DME Oman for March settled at $47.66 a barrel, down 9 cents, at 0830 GMT. This puts DME Oman at $2.50 a barrel below Dubai swaps, down from a discount of $2.21 in the previous session.
REFINERY
Kuwait has restarted a 122,000 barrels per day crude unit at the Mina al-Ahmadi refinery last week after a two-week shutdown for maintenance work, a spokesman of state-run oil refiner Kuwait National Petroleum Company (KNPC) said.
MARKET NEWS
A new crude blend from Venezuela made with its extra heavy output and Algerian oil has started arriving in the United States, helping to reverse declining shipments, internal reports from state-run PDVSA and Reuters trade data show.
Mexico's state oil company, Pemex, said on Thursday it has proposed an oil swap with the United States, potentially ushering in the first sustained crude imports by Mexico from its northern neighbour after years of self-sufficiency.
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