Russia's Crude Oil Shipments to Crucial Asian Markets Falter
Flows to China and India are more than 15% below their highs of late May
Russia’s seaborne crude exports in the seven days to July 1 rebounded from the previous week’s plunge, but shipments to Asia are slipping, even as flows are diverted to the country’s Black Sea terminal to cut the voyage distance to India.
Aggregate crude flows from Russian ports were up week-on-week by 23%, recovering most of the volume lost over the previous seven days during a brief halt in shipments from the Baltic port of Primorsk. Still, cargoes bound for Asia — a crucial market where China and India have stepped in to prop up Russian exports others have shunned in response to its invasion of Ukraine — were down by more than 15% on both a weekly and four-week average basis from the highs seen at the end of May.