Inventories of gasoil/diesel and jet fuel/kerosene held at the key oil storage hub fell to 7.363 million barrels in the week ended Jan. 3, from 8.091 million barrels in the previous week, data from Enterprise Singapore showed. [O/SING1]

Net exports of both gasoil/diesel and jet fuel/kerosene fell around 13% from a week ago.

Total exports of gasoil/diesel, however, did rise around 5%, which could have contributed to the decline in overall stockpiles.

Robust volumes heading to regional destinations such as Malaysia, Indonesia, Australia and Vietnam remained present, supporting the rise in total exports.

More notably, exports to South Africa resurfaced for the first time in three months, with the city-state shipping slightly more than 40,000 metric tons there for the week.

It could be a combination of limited regional demand forcing sellers to find outlets outside of Asia and a slight lack of material from the Middle East due to refinery maintenance and possibly more lucrative seller margins to Europe, one trade source said.

More than 80,000 tons of cargoes are likely to be loading from Asia to South Africa for January, Kpler shiptracking data showed.

Meanwhile, volumes from the Middle East and Russia to the Africas region have been declining since the last quarter of 2023, the data showed.

On the gasoil/diesel import front, imports from India came back into the picture for the first time in around a month - in line with earlier analyst expectations - as it was more profitable for traders to send cargoes east instead of west.

More than 60,000 tons of India-origin diesel/gasoil will likely reach Singapore shores in the next one week, shiptracking data from both LSEG and Kpler showed.

The east-west arbitrage differential, typically measured by the exchange of futures for swaps (EFS) values, has hovered between a discount of $20 and $50 a ton the past three weeks, pricing data from LSEG showed.

Some sellers could deem it as slightly unprofitable to send their spot cargoes to the West, a second source said.

Jet fuel/kerosene-wise, regional destinations continued to be the choice for sellers as most volumes were still headed to Australia, Bangladesh, the Philippines and Vietnam.

Total imports for the aviation and heating fuel however were minimal for the week.

(1 ton = around 7.45 barrels for gasoil)

(1 ton = around 7.88 barrels for jet fuel/kerosene)

(Reporting by Trixie Yap and Ashley Fang; Editing by Varun H K)

By Trixie Yap and Ashley Fang