Diesel Cracks Ease Back but Gasoline Holding Steady

Diesel crack spreads are easing lower today with weak near term demand and despite US refinery outages and the upcoming EU ban on Russian oil products.

• EIA data on Wednesday showed weak gasoline and diesel implied demand still at the bottom of the five year range.
• US refineries are slowly recovering from the severe weather outages at the end of December, but utilisation will again be limited during the upcoming maintenance season. Refinery maintenance is expected to be greater than normal this season due to work that was deferred from last year to take advantage of the high prices.
• Gasoline cracks have rallied quicker than diesel since mid December and are holding onto gains as the ability for Europe to source alternative naphtha and VGO for gasoline blending may be challenging. Russian diesel supplies may potentially find alternative destinations and Europe may be able to source alternative supplies.
  • US 321 crack down -0.7$/bbl at 37.73$/bbl
  • US gasoline crack down -0.3$/bbl at 28.69$/bbl
  • US ULSD crack down -1.6$/bbl at 55.81$/bbl
  • EU Gasoline-Brent up 0$/bbl at 15.22$/bbl
  • EU Gasoil-Brent down -1.7$/bbl at 37.77$/bbl