Middle East Crude-Benchmarks fall; Saudi Arabia may hike Nov oil prices

Middle East crude benchmarks Oman, Dubai and Murban fell on Tuesday, following a broad sell-off in the global oil market as a stronger U.S. dollar dented demand from buyers holding other currencies, while the market awaited the OPEC+ panel later this week.

Top oil exporter Saudi Arabia may raise the price of its flagship Arab Light crude to Asia for a fifth straight month in November, underpinned by its prolonged voluntary output cut and resilient oil demand in the region.

State oil giant Saudi Aramco 2222.SE may hike the official selling price (OSP) for its medium sour crude by about 45 cents a barrel for November, according to five respondents surveyed by Reuters, which would bring the price to its highest this year.

ASIAN REFINERIES

Japan’s biggest refiner, Eneos Corp, restarted the 141,000 barrels-per-day (bpd) crude distillation unit (CDU) at its Sakai refinery in western Japan on Sept. 19 after an unscheduled shutdown on Sept. 4, a company spokesperson said on Tuesday.

The refiner, which is a unit of Eneos Holdings Inc 5020.T, shut the unit only a few days after restarting it on Aug. 31 following a turnaround.

The spokesperson declined to give the reason for the shutdown.

SINGAPORE CASH DEALS

Cash Dubai’s premium to swaps dipped 35 cents to $3.33 a barrel.

NEWS

Venezuela’s oil exports in September topped 800,000 barrels per day (bpd), the second highest monthly average this year, as state-run oil firm PDVSA and its joint ventures recovered output, particularly in the Orinoco Belt.

Russia’s flagship Urals crude oil blend traded at $83.80 per barrel on average in September, up from $74.00 per barrel in August, Russia’s Finance Ministry said on Monday, with the price remaining comfortably above a Western price cap.

The U.S. Permian basin in Texas and New Mexico, the biggest U.S. shale oil basin, has enough additional oil to develop and will continue to grow in the next few years, Occidental Petroleum CEO Vicki Hollub said on Tuesday.

India will manage if the price of oil goes above $100 per barrel even though such a price would not be in “anyone’s interest,” the country’s petroleum minister said on Tuesday at a conference in Abu Dhabi.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Muyu Xu; Editing by Sohini Goswami)