Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil exporter, on Wednesday lowered its July prices for Asian buyers after OPEC+ hiked output for a fourth month although the price cut was smaller than expected.
Saudi Arabia’s state firm Aramco cut the official selling price for the flagship Arab light crude it sells to Asia for July to $1.20 a barrel above the Oman/Dubai average, 20 cents lower than June and the lowest since May.
Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies such as Russia are raising output. Eight OPEC+ countries on Saturday agreed to another big increase of 411,000 bpd for July, having increased output by the same amount in May and June.
However, Saudi Arabia’s 20-cent price cut was smaller than the 40-cent to 50-cent reduction expected in a Reuters survey.
“A smaller reduction was likely due to strong domestic crude burn in Saudi Arabia and refinery runs that could limit barrels available for export,” said Richard Jones, an analyst at consultancy Energy Aspects.
The Middle East typically burns crude and high-sulphur fuel oil for power between June and August, for the peak demand season. Analysts expected Saudi to burn more crude oil for power generation this summer.
Saudi crude OSPs set the price trend for other grades exported by Iran, Kuwait and Iraq, affecting about 9 million barrels per day of crude bound for Asia.
The tables below show the full free-on-board prices for June in U.S. dollars.
Saudi term crude supplies to Asia are priced as a
differential to the Oman/Dubai average:
July June CHANGE
SUPER LIGHT 1.75 1.95 -0.20
EXTRA LIGHT 1.00 1.20 -0.20
LIGHT 1.20 1.40 -0.20
MEDIUM 0.75 0.85 -0.10
HEAVY -0.30 -0.30 0
Prices at Ras Tanura destined for United States
are set against ASCI:
July June CHANGE
EXTRA LIGHT 5.75 5.65 0.10
LIGHT 3.50 3.40 0.10
MEDIUM 3.50 3.50 0
HEAVY 3.05 3.05 0
Prices at Ras Tanura destined for Northwest
Europe are set against ICE Brent:
July June CHANGE
EXTRA LIGHT 4.85 3.05 1.80
LIGHT 3.25 1.45 1.80
MEDIUM 2.45 0.65 1.80
HEAVY 0.05 -1.75 1.80
Prices at Ras Tanura for Saudi oil destined for
the Mediterranean are set against ICE Brent:
July June CHANGE
EXTRA LIGHT 4.75 2.95 1.80
LIGHT 3.05 1.25 1.80
MEDIUM 2.45 0.65 1.80
HEAVY -0.25 -2.05 1.80
