Mid-Day Oil Summary: Oil Edges Lower

Front month Brent crude recovered from an intra-day low of $88.78/bbl amid a lack of progress in ceasefire talks. Crude prices halted its recent rally on Monday after Israel said on Sunday it had withdrawn more soldiers from southern Gaza and fresh ceasefire talks are underway.

• Brent JUN 24 down 0.8% at 90.46$/bbl
• WTI MAY 24 down 0.8% at 86.22$/bbl
• Reuters reporting comments from an unnamed Hamas official claiming that "no progress has yet been made" in the ceasefire talks that are taking place in Cairo. The comments come in contrast to those made by a senior Egyptian official earlier on 8 Apr claiming that there had been some movement towards a ceasefire agreement.
• Brent crude prices are expected to remain below $100/bbl – in the base case – amid solid oil demand, no additional geopolitical supply issues and increased OPEC+ production from Q3, Goldman Sachs said in a note.
• Yemen’s Houthi rebels stepped up activity in the Red Sea with new missile attacks on vessels over the weekend.
• Iraq is working on repairing a pipeline that could allow it to send 350kbd to Turkey by the end of the month according to Reuters reports from an Iraqi oil minister on Monday.
• The amount of crude oil held around the world on tankers that have been stationary for at least seven days fell sharply in the past week by 17% to 65.30m bbl as of 5 April, Vortexa data showed.
• China’s independent refineries in the Shandong Province are estimated to import 70% less Sokol crude in April and May compared with March arrivals due to higher prices, sources told S&P Commodity Insights.
• The arrival of feedstocks into independent refineries in Shandong province was 10.39m mt in March, up 3.87% on the month, according to OilChem.
• CDU utilisation rates at state-owned refineries are projected to continue falling in the week to April 11, according to OilChem.
• State-owned refiners in China will reduce processing volumes to 41.38m mt in April, according to OilChem, cited by Bloomberg.
• China is expected to issue its second batch of refined oil export quotas, with a volume of 18m mt, according to OilChem, citing market sources.
• Indian oil demand rose by 6.75% on the month to 21.09mn tons in March, data from the Petroleum, Planning and Analysis Cell showed.
• Mexico’s Pemex had a fire on its Akal-B oil platform in the Campeche Bank Saturday.
• Russian officials claim to have the competencies to carry out repairs on its oil refineries damaged by Ukrainian drone attacks.
• Forteinvest’s Orsk oil refinery halted operations on Friday due to flooding in the region, the operator said via Telegram.
• Flint Hills’ Corpus Christi West, Texas, refinery restarted the 57kbpd FCC on 5 April after the unit was shut following a fire on 27 March according to WoodMac.
• Exxon Mobil’s 523kbpd Baton Rouge, Louisiana, refinery is undergoing maintenance at one of the four crude units and the respective VDU until the end of next week, sources told Bloomberg.
• US gasoline cracks are edging slightly higher but remained well below last week’s high.
  • US gasoline crack up 0.4$/bbl at 30.15$/bbl
  • US ULSD crack down 0$/bbl at 28.88$/bbl