The queue of VLCCs waiting outside of Ras Tanura, the world’s largest oil export terminal, has started to shorten as Saudi Arabia taps into its crude inventories to maintain exports.
The 318,900-dwt VLCC Maran Arete (built 2016) became the first vessel to load from Ras Tanura on Tuesday following last weekend’s drone attacks, which had knocked out 5.7m-barrel-per-day (bpd) oil production in Saudi Arabia, according to Kpler.
As of late Wednesday, six VLCCs were waiting to load from the terminal or the adjacent Juaymah single mooring points, compared with 14 VLCCs on Monday morning.
Saudi officials have promised to restore crude production at the attacked facilities in Abqaiq and Khurais by the end of September, while continuing exports with stocks and output from other fields.
Data from Kpler showed Saudi crude exports reached 6.5m bpd between 16 and 18 September, down from the usual volume of 7m to 8m bpd. Inventories were down 2.5m barrels from the week-ago level.
The supply disruption has led to increases in crude tanker rates, though analysts predict the positive effects will dissipate soon as Saudi exports resume.
As of Thursday morning, Clarksons Platou Securities assessed spot VLCC earnings at $36,800 per day, up 34.1% week-on-week. Suezmax earnings were up 25.2% at $18,600 per day and aframax earnings up 7% at $16,600 per day.
There have been reports that Saudi Arabia is increasing imports of oil products after cutting crude supplies to domestic refineries. Saudi Aramco, the country’s national oil firm, has not commented on this.
Fixture data from Bloomberg showed five LR1s and one MR product tanker were chartered this week for shipments of gasoline or distillates to the Middle East Gulf. The vessels are scheduled to load from India or northwest Europe between 20 and 25 September.
They are the 73,700-dwt Ploutos (built 2006), 73,600-dwt Norstar Invictus (built 2007), 74,000-dwt Amber (built 2008), 74,500-dwt Hafnia Australia (built 2010), 74,900-dwt Jag Aparna and 50,000-dwt High Leader (built 2018). It cannot be immediately confirmed whether they will be discharging at Saudi ports.
The restart of Ras Tanura loadings comes as Thursday's VLCC fixtures showed firming rates in the Middle East Gulf.
Tankers International reported that Chinese chartering giant Unipec picked up DHT's 320,000-dwt DHT Condor (built 2004) for WorldScale 69.5 for a journey from South Korea to load in the Gulf and deliver in China. The deal equates to time charter equivalent earnings of nearly $35,000 per day for
Similarly, Dutch trader Trafigura booked Pantheon Tankers' 318,000-dwt Astro Chloe (built 2009) for a round trip from China loading in the Gulf, at a rate of WS 68 or the equivalent of $36,800 per day in TCE earnings.
The fixtures compare to last done Gulf-to-China journey at WS 66 on Tuesday and just WS 52.50 last week.
Eric Martin contributed to this report.
