ESPO Blend Makes Splash in Asia

SINGAPORE — Refiners across Asia have warmed up to Russian ESPO crude barely two months after shipments began, raising eyebrows from Riyadh to Rio de Janeiro as producers vie for leadership in the world's fastest-growing oil market.

ESPO's growing acceptance as output ramps up toward 600,000 barrels per day is an early sign of success for Russia's strategy to boost its share of sales to Asian crude importers, to some degree at the expense of Middle East suppliers.

Oil transported via the East Siberia-Pacific Ocean pipeline in the Far East is putting prices of competing waterborne Middle East and Asia-Pacific crudes under strain, benefiting refiners hungry for secure alternatives.

"Eventually, it would be a very significant alternative source of supply, and the proximity of very large Asian consumers creates a competitive advantage," said Harry Tchilinguirian, head of commodities research at BNP Paribas in London.

The cost of shipping Middle Eastern crude to Northeast Asia on a very large crude carrier, or VLCC, stood at $1.98 per barrel on Feb. 23, Reuters data show.

Adding the free-on-board, or FOB, cost of Oman crude, now valued at a discount of about 50 cents to Dubai quotes, the price of a delivered Oman cargo would be almost $1.50 above Dubai, versus premiums of at most 50 cents or even discounts for ESPO.

"They have established themselves quite well, as the first few cargoes found value pretty fast and at a very reasonable level," said a trader with a refining firm that has bought ESPO.

ESPO accounts for about 0.3 percent of current world oil supply and that proportion is expected to climb to about 0.7 percent by 2012. Total ESPO shipments of about 7 million barrels in January were equivalent to less than 6 percent of China's imports for the month, which amounted to 125 million barrels.

Nascent crude oil streams typically face challenges to becoming a staple among target buyers, trading at hefty discounts to their benchmarks for some time after introduction.

The usual accumulation of unsold supplies plays against the interest of producers, who are forced to sell at lower prices. But shipping fixtures show that ESPO is increasingly being sent to specific ports near refineries where it can be processed, instead of having options to stay in floating storage.

Over the past month, Russian firms including Rosneft have placed several ESPO cargoes with refiners in South Korea, Japan and Malaysia, capping marketing efforts with Unipec, which last week became the grade's first Chinese buyer.

Unipec paid a small premium to Dubai quotes for the cargo to be loaded on March 17 and 18 at the Russian port of Kozmino near Vladivostok, traders said.

Korean refiners had taken the grade since early February, followed by ExxonMobil's purchase for processing at a joint venture with Japanese refiner Mitsui in Chiba, Japan.

ESPO has potentially reached markets beyond initial industry expectations. Some cargoes have gone to Taiwan and as far as Thailand and Hawaii, where traders said Vitol sent a cargo. This would mean that ESPO is being processed at refineries in the world's top two oil consumers, the United States and China.

For now, Chinese refiners say they will limit ESPO purchases to meeting sporadic needs via the spot market as they rely on their staple Middle East crude, though China bought less last month from Saudi Arabia and Iran, as it raised imports from Africa and smaller Gulf producers Kuwait and Iraq.

Oil producers from the Middle East and Latin America have been trying to establish export hubs in North Asia for some time. With ESPO, Russia has an intrinsic geographical edge.

Shipments from the Middle East can take up to three weeks to reach North Asia, while from Brazil the trip takes some five weeks. Most plants in the region are four days away from Kozmino.

ESPO is more appealing than faraway oil as there is no need to rely on sustained workable arbitrage economics, refiners say.

"The crude is much better than other Persian Gulf grades, and the voyage is much shorter, so it's attractive for most of us," said a trader with an East Asian refiner that may soon try ESPO.

"ESPO is a very vanilla kind of grade, a good grade, much more pleasant than Oman, so refiners in Northeast Asia should be all over it," a trader said.

The completion of a pipeline to China from the Siberian town of Skovorodino by 2012 will take output to about 600,000 bpd from 250,000 bpd projected in the first quarter, making it easier for Chinese refiners to buy ESPO regularly, possibly via term deals.

"Once you have that kind of volume and consumer acceptance, you are looking at a situation where Middle East grades would be at a disadvantage," said Tchilinguirian from BNP Paribas.