SINGAPORE: Asian gasoil prices firmed on Tuesday, helped by a recent flurry of buy tenders from Egypt, trade sources said.
Saudi Aramco informed the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation, Egypt's state oil company, in early October that it would halt the supply of refined oil products to Egypt, a government official told Reuters, without giving a timeline for the suspension or a reason.
Taiwan's CPC Corp sold a 500ppm sulphur gasoil cargo at a slight premium to Singapore quotes and a 10ppm sulphur diesel cargo at a premium of about 50 cents a barrel, traders said.
The buyers could not immediately be confirmed.
The price is higher than traders anticipated, but the reason for the gain could not immediately be confirmed.
CPC exports about 2 to 3 medium-range sized gasoil cargoes every month, one of the traders said.
Japan's Showa Shell Sekiyu said on Tuesday its affiliate Seibu Oil had restarted the 120,000 barrels-per-day (bpd) sole crude distillation unit (CDU) at Yamaguchi refinery in western Japan on Friday.
The CDU had been shut since Aug. 31, company spokespeople said.
Hong Kong-based trader Winson Oil has bought a very large crude carrier (VLCC) to store oil in the Mediterranean as it pushes to expand its business in Europe, two company sources said.
Winson bought the VLCC in July for $28 million and has renamed it Winson No. 5, one of the sources said.
The ship is currently docked in Shenzhen, China, for repairs and maintenance and will be moved in about 1 or 2 months, ready to receive oil products.
"The plan is to store gasoil and the ship will first travel to Singapore and eventually to the Mediterranean Sea as offshore inventory storage," the source said. He did not give a timeframe for the move to Europe.
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