Nigeria imported the lowest volume of gasoline on record last month, despite reports of a two-week turnaround at one of its key gasoline-yielding units.
Seaborne gasoline arrivals into west Africa's largest economy dropped by roughly a quarter on the month to 105,000 b/d in August, according to vessel-tracking data from Kpler, setting a new record low after 116,000 b/d was recorded in June.
The Netherlands and Togo each accounted for around a third of deliveries to Nigeria. EU, UK and Norwegian-origin gasoline imports into Nigeria accounted for just 65,000 b/d last month, also the lowest on Kpler records stretching back to 2017.
The record low imports of gasoline cargoes last month defied dominant market sentiment that a two-week turnaround at Nigeria's 650,000 b/d Dangote refinery's RFCC unit could tighten regional supply in August. Benchmark non-oxy gasoline barge cracks to front-month Ice Brent rallied to $15.92/bl in the month of August, the first month this year to record a year-on-year rise in gasoline refining profitability.
But it appears that domestic Nigerian gasoline supply was little affected by the works, and that little buying interest emerged for foreign supplies. Market participants suggested that the Dangote refinery had ample gasoline in stock last month, cushioning a likely drop in output.
Indeed, European gasoline exports — of which Nigeria received 193,000 b/d in August last year — tanked to 879,000 b/d in August, the lowest on record for the month, according to Kpler, with a combination of subdued Nigerian import demand as well as lacklustre US gasoline import demand, as domestic arbitrage saw the US Atlantic coast pull in more volume from the Gulf coast than from northwest Europe.
Offshore Lome — nominally Togo under vessel-tracking movements — is playing an increasingly greater function as a supply hub of swing gasoline barrels into west Africa since the Dangote refinery began gasoline production a year ago. Togolese deliveries last month were the highest since July 2020 and year-to-date Togolese arrivals in Nigeria accounted for a record-breaking 12pc of all gasoline imports into the country, up from 1.4pc last year.
Non-oxy gasoline margins have started September strongly, reaching 15-month highs of $19.83/bl to front-month Ice Brent on 4 September. An outage at the 285,000 b/d RFCC last week has supported a rise in gasoline cracks, according to one gasoline trader, besides tighter supply of gasoline blending component MTBE in northwest Europe. Gasoline imports into Nigeria stood at 134,000 b/d in the first week of September, according to Kpler vessel-tracking data, somewhat above August levels.
