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China’s Independent Refiners Increase Fuel Oil Imports In Feb

OIL PRODUCTS

China's small independent refineries doubled their fuel oil imports on the month in February amid good refining margins and tight supply of the alternative feedstock bitumen blend, refining and trading sources told S&P.

  • At least eleven cargoes totaling 1mn t, or 198kbpd, are to be discharged over Feb, compared with around 510,000 t in Jan and Dec each, S&P estimates show.
  • Malaysia-origin fuel oil contributed the most to the increase, with an increase of 188% to 634,000 t from 220,000 t in Jan, according to shipping data from Kpler.
  • Russian barrels rose by around 179% month on month to 390,000 t in Feb, Kpler data show.
  • Some of the independent refineries have not been awarded any crude import quotas for 2023. These refineries usually either take imported crude in the domestic market with quotas bought from other holders or import bitumen blend. They now have to turn to imported fuel oil as the recent tax investigation conducted by local governments threatens quota trading while supplies of bitumen blend fall.

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