SINGAPORE: Sales of marine fuel, also known as bunker fuel, hit four-month highs in May at the UAE’s Fujairah, recovering for a third consecutive month, latest Fujairah Oil Industry Zone data showed.
Bunker sales at Fujairah provide a gauge of shipping market sentiment in the Middle East, as Fujairah is the world’s third-largest bunkering port and a key transit and blending hub for oil products.
The recovery in May came in line with higher sales trends at the world’s largest bunker hub Singapore, where monthly volumes recently hit over five-year highs.
Total bunker volumes, excluding lubricants, were at 620,388 cubic metres (about 615,000 tonnes) in May, showed data from the Fujairah Oil Industry Zone published late on Thursday by industry information service S&P Global Commodity Insights.
The sales were up 4.0% month on month but were 16.7% lower than the same month last year.
The uptick was led by a climb in low-sulphur bunker sales, which totalled 493,802 cubic meters, or about 489,000 metric tons, counting both residual fuels and marine gasoils, rebounding 5.2% from April.
Cash premiums for fuel oil little changed in Asia
Meanwhile, high-sulphur bunker sales dipped slightly month-on-month at 126,586 cubic meters, or about 125,000 metric tons.
This brought the market share of low-sulphur bunkers to 80% and of high-sulphur bunkers to 20% in April, versus 79% and 21% in March, respectively.
However, overall demand for bunkers at Fujairah has softened this year, Dubai-based trade sources said.
Bunker volumes averaged below 600,000 metric tons a month in 2023 so far, down from 2022’s monthly average of about 664,000 metric tons a month, the data showed.
A bunker trader at Fujairah said the lower monthly volume could be a “new normal” going ahead.
Fujairah prices for delivered 0.5% marine fuel have dropped in May and June to single-digit premiums versus benchmark Singapore cargo quotes, compared with double-digit bunker premiums for the same product at Singapore.
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