South Korea consumed 66.75 million barrels of refined oil products in March, down 4.1% from a year earlier when it used 69.45 million barrels, data released by state-run Korea National Oil Corp. showed.
Oil product consumption was down 3.3% from 69.01 million barrels in February.
South Korean refiners processed 75.69 million barrels of crude oil last month, down 3.5% from 78.44 million barrels a year earlier, and down 0.4% from February's 75.96 million barrels.
The refiners produced 81.61 million barrels of oil products in March, down 4.0% from 85.01 million barrels in the same month last year, and down 2.0% from February's 83.30 million barrels.
The country's oil product exports in March came in at 34.31 million barrels, up 1.0% from 33.98 million barrels a year earlier, but down 1.8% from February's 34.95 million barrels.
South Korea imported 22.74 million barrels of refined oil products in March, up 4.6% year-on-year from 21.74 million barrels and down 9.2% from February's 25.04 million barrels.
The country also imported 73.48 million barrels of crude oil in March, down 8.3% from a year earlier when it bought 80.07 million barrels, down 9.2% from February's 80.82 million barrels. It paid $8.81 billion for March crude imports, up from $8.28 billion a year earlier as international prices went up by 16.5%.
South Korea has 12.46 million barrels of crude oil stocks as of the end of March, little changed from 12.45 million barrels in February, but down 14.3% from 14.54 million barrels a year earlier. Its oil product stocks stand at 51.70 million barrels as of the end of March, up slightly from 51.69 million barrels in February, but down from 52.97 million barrels a year earlier.
Source: Platts