The September Brent futures flat price has had an afternoon of two distinct halves, initially falling from $82.40/bbl at 12:30 BST to $81.65/bbl by $81.65/bbl, before then recovering these losses to sit at $82.30/bbl as of 17:15 BST (time of writing). Naftogaz’s CEO announced today that the volume of oil transited through Ukraine in July through the Druzhba pipeline was almost the same as in previous periods, despite the absence of oil belonging to sanctioned Russian firm Lukoil. However, Hungary and Slovakia are imploring the European Commission to help convince Ukraine to reinstate the transit of Lukoil’s crude, given the firm is responsible for 33% and 45% of their crude oil imports, respectively. Interestingly, Indonesia’s Pertamina has added Russian oil grades to its tender lists to buy September crude, the first time it has sought the country’s crude in over 10 years. An estimated 348kb/d of production are at risk in Alberta due to the threat of wildfires resulting from heat blasts. Finally, the Dangote Group has defended the quality of diesel output from its 650kb/d refinery after the country’s downstream regulator said it contained much higher levels of sulphur than imported product. At the time of writing, the front and 6-month spreads are $0.98/bbl and $3.56/bbl, respectively.
