Gasoline refining margins in northwest Europe extended falls on Thursday as historically high stocks in the United States continued to limit transatlantic arbitrage, sending cargoes instead to West Africa. Europe's gasoline exports to West Africa climbed by more than 60 percent month-on-month in February to a total of at least 1.78 million tonnes, industry monitor Genscape said in a report.
An unplanned outage at Gabon's only refinery has led to shortages of gasoline in the capital Libreville, the government said. Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) said its Warri refinery has stopped some operations due to power issues. Unions said it had halted petrol production for normal maintenance and will resume next week.
Gasoline stocks in independently held storage in the Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp (ARA) hub fell by 2.84 percent in the week to Thursday, data from Dutch consultancy PJK International showed. US gasoline stocks fell last week but by a smaller amount than expected and remain at historically high levels. US benchmark RBOB prices extend falls, slipped by as much as 3 percent. Saudi Aramco plans to shut its 126,000 bpd crude oil refinery in Riyadh for planned maintenance from March 1 for 80 days.
Marathon Petroleum 459,000 bpd Galveston Bay Refinery in Texas was restarting a crude distillation unit shut as part of a two-month, multi-unit overhaul, sources said. No barges of benchmark European gasoline traded in the afternoon window with no bids nor offers, the same as on Wednesday. On Tuesday, a bid emerged at $532 a tonne fob ARA, down from $547 a tonne on Monday. Earlier in the day, 16,000 tonnes traded at $509-$525 a tonne fob Amsterdam-Rotterdam, with prices falling through the course of the day. This compared with trades at $535-538 a tonne during the previous session.
No barges of premium unleaded gasoline traded, although an offer emerged at $516 a tonne fob ARA, compared to an offer of $542 on Wednesday. Brent crude futures fell $1.10 to $55.26 a barrel by 1740 GMT. Gasoline barge refining margins declined to $7.030 a barrel from $8.471 a barrel a day earlier.
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