Saudis to keep Asia shipments steady

Tokyo: Saudi Arabia, the world's top crude exporter, will keep oil shipments mostly steady next month, although one Asian customer was expecting slightly more supply than in April, trade sources said on Friday.

"It is the same volume as April," one European refiner said of the May allocations. At least three buyers in Asia also reported unchanged shipments for next month. "We've received a notice that the supply will be the contracted volumes, or full, for May," one trader said.

There was no indication for now on allocations to US buyers.

Asian customers, who are charged more than other regions for their crude, have been receiving mostly full contract volumes since November last year, although there have been minor variations.

The extra supplies to one Asian customer would amount to only about 5,000 barrels per day (bpd) and traders said they were reflective of the kingdom's marketing strategy, not a shift in policy.

A source with a refiner said it had received a notice for full contracted volumes after its shipments were unexpectedly cut by 5 percent in April, when most of its peers were allocated 100 per cent of their contracted supplies. The source added the cut in April was mainly in the heavier grades.

"There may be a trend that it's easy to make a cut to a lifter with large contracted volumes, although it may not make such a cut to a smaller lifter," said a source close to the Saudi allocation.

The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) has kept its output policy unchanged since September last year when it agreed a supply increase of 500,000 bpd effective from November 1.