據今日油價9月21日報道，盡管市場的大部分注意力都集中在汽油需求將以多快的速度復蘇上，但全球各地經濟和制造業活動的下降已導致包括柴油、汽油和航空燃料在內的餾分油供應過剩。在疫情期間，航空燃油需求出現了前所未有的暴跌，面對這種情況，煉油商紛紛轉向其他餾分油的生產，而這些餾分油的庫存已升至數十年來的最高水平。

近幾周，柴油和其它中間餾分油的供過于求情況變得十分明顯，以至于交易員們開始租用油輪來儲存燃料，以便日后銷售。

在餾分油庫存遠高于5年平均水平、全球燃料需求復蘇乏力的情況下，煉油商沒有太多動力消化增加的產量，煉油利潤率因供過于求而大幅下滑。

國際能源署(IEA)本周在其月度旗艦石油市場報告中稱，煉廠利潤持續疲弱，對增加原油購買沒有起到一絲的激勵作用。

燃料需求疲弱繼續抑制油價突破每桶40美元，盡管美國原油庫存數據本周提振了油價。不過，美國能源信息署在公布截至9月11日的一周原油庫存為440萬桶的同時，也公布了9月第二周餾分燃料的生產量為350萬桶,這些庫存量仍比五年平均水平高出20%。

截至9月11日的當周，美國煉廠的原油日產量為1348.8萬桶，較去年同期下降19.3%。餾分油庫存增至1.793億桶，同比增長31.2%。

餾分油庫存一直在持續上升，盡管煉油商將更多的原油加工成汽油，而不是中間餾分油。據路透社專欄作家約翰?肯普(John Kemp)估計，去年同期，汽油與餾分油之比從1.4：1升至1.7 ：1。

美國需求疲軟，中間餾分油也在努力尋找其他市場。在經濟低迷的背景下，燃料需求復蘇慢于預期，而航空燃料消耗仍處于不穩定狀態，這已將全球餾分油庫存推至多年高點，進而導致世界各地的煉油利潤率都處于災難性的低水平，使煉油廠無法將增加的原油加工成燃料。

航空燃料以外的煉油產品利潤率也在下滑，因為在需求如此之低的情況下，煉油商不愿生產過多的航空燃料，而是更愿意生產其他餾分油。

例如，據Argus估計，新加坡燃料油精煉利潤率本周暴跌至紀錄低點，因煉油商希望最大限度地提高燃料油的產量而不是航空燃料油，導致供應增加。

從美國墨西哥灣沿岸到歐洲阿姆斯特丹-鹿特丹-安特衛普(ARA)交易中心，柴油和汽油等餾分油的庫存異常高。

油輪所有者和油輪跟蹤公司本周對彭博社表示，全球餾分油供應過剩日益加劇的最強烈信號之一，可能是交易商對租用油品油輪來儲存柴油的興趣日益濃厚。在西北歐，柴油和噴氣燃料的浮式儲存量正在上升，因為期貨價格在晚些時候的交貨價格高于前一個月的價格，這通常意味著供應過剩，因此貿易商有理由支付租用油輪的費用，并在以后出售產品時獲得利潤。

彭博社估計，柴油市場的期貨溢價甚至高于原油，表明人們對餾分油浮式存儲的興趣可能高于原油。弱于預期的需求復蘇跡象抑制了餾分油的消費，并導致市場供過于求，這將繼續壓低油價。

王佳晶 摘譯自 今日油價

原文如下：

High Diesel Inventories Weigh On Oil Markets

While most of the market’s attention has been focused on how fast gasoline demand will recover, lower economic and manufacturing activity in all regions of the world has led to an oversupply in distillates, including diesel, gasoil, and jet fuel. Faced with an unprecedented crash in jet fuel demand amid the pandemic, refiners have geared toward making more of the other distillate fuels, whose stocks have risen to levels not seen in decades.

The glut in diesel and other middle distillates has become so evident in recent weeks that traders have started to charter tankers to store fuels for sale at a later date.

With distillate inventories sitting well above five-year averages and global fuel demand recovery faltering, refiners don’t have much incentive to process increased volumes because the refining margins have tumbled with the glut.

“Persistently weak refinery margins provide little incentive to boost crude purchases,” the International Energy Agency (IEA) said in its monthly flagship Oil Market Report this week.

Weak demand for fuels continues to curb any price gains above $40, despite the fact that a U.S. crude inventory draw this week boosted prices. However, while reporting a crude oil inventory draw of 4.4 million barrels for the week to September 11, the U.S. Energy Information Administration also reported a build of 3.5 million barrels in distillate fuels for the second week of September, with those inventories still remaining more than 20 percent above the five-year average as air travel remains constricted by pandemic-related restrictions and concerns.

Crude oil inputs at U.S. refiners were 13.488 million bpd in the week to September 11, which was 19.3 percent lower than in the same week last year. Distillate inventories swelled to 179.3 million barrels, up by 31.2 percent from year ago.

Distillate stocks have been persistently rising, despite the fact that refiners have been processing more crude into gasoline instead of middle distillates. The gasoline-to-distillate ratio in the product slate has increased to 1.7 to 1 from 1.4 to 1 at the same time last year, according to estimates by Reuters columnist John Kemp.

Middle distillates are struggling to find markets amid weak demand outside the United States, too. Slower-than-expected fuel demand recovery amid the economic slump and still precariously low aviation fuel consumption have sent distillate stocks around the world to multi-year highs. This, in turn, has led to disastrously low refining margins in every part of the world, discouraging refiners to process increased volumes of crude into fuels.

Refining margins of products other than jet fuel are also slumping because refiners are now reluctant to produce too much aviation fuel with demand so low, instead preferring to make other distillates.

For example, the Singapore gasoil refining margins plunged this week to a record low, according to Argus estimates, as supply increased with refiners looking to maximize production of gasoil over jet fuel.

Stocks of distillates such as diesel and gasoil are uncharacteristically high everywhere, from the U.S. Gulf Coast to the Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp (ARA) trading hub in Europe.

Probably one of the strongest signals of a growing global glut in distillates is increased interest from traders to hire oil product tankers to store diesel as floating storage, tanker owners and tanker-tracking firms told Bloomberg this week. Floating storage of diesel and jet fuel is on the rise in northwest Europe with the contango – in which prices for delivery at later dates are higher than front-month prices that typically points to oversupply – widening and making sense for traders to pay for chartering tankers and still make profits when they sell the product later.

Bloomberg’s estimates show that the contango in the diesel market is even wider than it is for crude oil, suggesting that interest in floating storage of distillates could be higher than that for crude.

Weaker-than-expected demand recovery has depressed distillate fuel consumption and led to a glut, which is set to continue to depress oil prices.