May Brent futures saw price action at $82.60/bbl at noon, followed by a steady correction down to $81.78/bbl handles around 13:20 GMT, and subsequently a mixed afternoon to settle around $82.36/bbl levels at the time of writing, 17:00 GMT.
Amid the Russian embargo to Germany, Kazakh energy minister Almasadam Satkaliyev stated that Kazakhstan may double its crude exports via the Druzhba pipeline to 2 million mt following requests from German companies to increase volumes on Mar 05. An existing agreement of 1.2 million mt is currently in place, with 100,000 mt delivered in January. Crude from supply arrangements with Kazakhstan during the embargo has proved crucial for German refineries, most notably the Schwedt refinery near Berlin which relies directly on crude imported through the Druzhba pipeline.
Meanwhile, Russia’s Belgorod region has been subjected to drone attacks, with an explosion and fire at the Gubkin oil depot, around 90km from the Ukrainian border. The attack follows numerous drone strike attempts at Russian energy infrastructure in the previous days, with attempts on the St. Petersburg oil terminal and a tank farm in Leningrad among others. The former was able to avoid the attack, representing the second attempted strike on the terminal in 3 months, and which is crucial to operations on the Baltic Sea, acting as a storage facility to some 12 million mt/year of oil.
The front and 6-month spreads are at $0.72/bbl and $3.76/bbl respectively.
