Royal Dutch Shell plc (ADR) ADR Class B (NYSE:RDS.B) has successfully grabbed over 8 million barrels of oncoming crude oil from both Middle East and Russia regions. With the increasing demand for oil in Asia, the company has taken the advantage of the robust business opportunity to resell the crude oil cargoes at high premiums thus making elevated sales revenues. The company declined to comment on the subject.
The high demand is as the result of the widening Brent premium to Dubai that has significantly made the supply of the Atlantic crude oil products quite expensive compared to the Middle East and Russian oil supplies. Shell has focused on acquiring oil cargoes from different suppliers located in various regions in the Middle East including Qatar Marine, Upper Zakum, Russian Sokol, Banoco Arab Medium, and al-Shaheen. According to the reports, the company has an option to resell the crude oil or send it back to the refiners.
The demand for crude oil is set to go up in Asian region particularly in the third quarter of the year as the refining firms reopen following the maintenance period to catch up with the high demand for the oil products.
According to the latest news from Reuters, Shell could emerge the sole supplier of the crude oil in the two regions as it has acquired a large share of the supply a move that could give the firm an opportunity to grow its sales in the new markets. Currently, the demand for oil products in Asia is high and it will continue to rise in the near future. For instance,
China alone is expected to import over 9 million bpd within this month and this could increase in the subsequent months after the maintenance season is over. In addition, due to high oil prices, most refineries may not be willing to reduce their rates in the next few months.
