Europe Gasoline/Naphtha-Gasoline cracks end week lower

Northwest European gasoline refining margins edged higher by 37 cents on Friday to about $6.72 a barrel, ending the week $1.53 lower than the previous Friday.

Some 12,000 metric tons of Eurobob E5 barges were traded. Gunvor, Litasco and TotalEnergies sold to Shell, BP and Glencore.

A further 10,000 tons of Eurobob E10 barges traded, with Varo and Gunvor selling to Litasco and Glencore.

Crack spreads fell over the week against a backdrop of lower exports in October, but improved transatlantic arbitrage economics could soon see profit margins pick up, analysts said.

“Northwest European and West Mediterranean exports edged down slightly in October, with reduced demand from across the Atlantic mostly offset by limited supply. Eurobob cracks pulled back amid higher upstream crude values,” said LSEG analyst Abdul Hadhi.

“European competitiveness improves after a rally in the Transatlantic arbitrage and a correction in blending components prices, improving the outlook for the Eurobob complex in the short term,” said Sparta Commodities analyst Jorge Molinero.

Independently held oil gasoline stocks in Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp (ARA) fell in the week to Thursday by less than 1%, according to data from Dutch consultancy Insights Global.

Stocks fell as exports out of the region picked up slightly, Insights Global’s Lars van Wageningen said.

U.S. gasoline stockpiles fell unexpectedly last week to a two-year low on strengthened demand, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) said on Wednesday.

Gasoline stocks fell by 2.7 million barrels in the week ending Oct. 25 to 210.9 million barrels, their lowest since November 2021. Analysts in a Reuters poll had forecast a 600,000-barrel build.

Lyondell Basell Industries plans to permanently shut its 263,776 barrels-per-day Houston refinery in two stages, with the first in January and the second in February, Kim Foley, head of the company’s refining operations, said on Friday.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Robert Harvey; editing by Alan Barona)