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Russia cut in half railway gasoline exports in March after fuel embargo

Russia cut train exports of fuel by half in March after imposing a fuel embargo, with rising domestic need and unplanned refinery outages tightening its home market, data offered by 2 market sources and estimations revealed.

At the end of February Russia imposed a six-month restriction on gasoline exports from March 1 to keep rates stable amid rising need from customers and farmers and to permit upkeep of refineries worldwide's second largest oil exporter.

Exceptions were produced fuel supplied under inter-governmental arrangements, consisting of with members of the Moscow-led Eurasian Economic Union.

According to calculations based upon data from sources, Russian refineries exported about 323,000 metric lots of gas by rail in March.

That flowed primarily to Mongolia, which took 75,500 loads, Uzbekistan, which took 53,500 loads, Tajikistan, which got 47,800 tons, and Kyrgyzstan, with 42,300 tons.

Just about 16,500 metric tons of gasoline were delivered last month for export by means of the Russian Baltic port of Ust-Luga, almost 13,300 loads to the Arctic port of Murmansk, and nothing to the ports of Vysotsk, St Petersburg and Novorossiisk, data from the market sources showed.

Traders anticipated additional decreases in Russian gas exports due to seasonal maintenance and unplanned blackouts on refineries.

At the end of March about 14% of Russia's main oil refining capacity had actually been partially stopped for repairs after Ukrainian drone attacks, according to calculations.

Russia's daily offline primary oil refining capacity in April is anticipated to increase by 9.5% from March to 4.323 million tons, computations based on information from market sources showed.

Russia might also increase gasoline imports for its domestic market from neighbouring Belarus to take on the threat of local shortages.

Considering that an EU embargo on imports of Russian oil items went into impact in February 2023, Russia has diverted its gas export materials to countries in Africa and Asia, Turkey and Brazil.

A lack of Russian barrels will open up space on worldwide markets for European sellers, traders included.