S.Korea's Oct crude oil imports from Iran down 9.5% on-month
SEOUL (Reuters) — South Korea's imports of Iranian crude oil fell 9.5% in October from the previous month as the Middle Eastern country cut crude and condensate exports to Asia due to production setbacks.
South Korea, one of Iran's main Asian clients, brought in 1.65 MMt of Iranian crude in October, or 390,675 bpd, customs data showed on Wednesday. That is a 9.5% decline from 1.83 MMt in September, but still up nearly 83% from last year.
Iran is South Korea's main supplier of ultra-light oil, also known as condensate, but the data does not provide a breakdown of imports.
The drop in Iran's oil exports to South Korea comes amid ongoing efforts by Tehran to ramp up its oil output since sanctions were lifted last year in a bid to recoup its lost market share.
But Iran has experienced production setbacks and reduced its condensate shipments due to a "technical problem" at the South Pars field that has prompted 1–2 mos of maintenance, the National Iranian Oil Company's Director of International Affairs Saeid Khoshrou told Reuters in late September.
Over January-October this year, oil shipments from Iran jumped 46.5% to about 15.7 MMt, or 378,447 bpd, versus 10.72 MMt during the same period a year ago, according to the customs data.
Overall, the world's No.5 crude importer's total imports in October were 12.44 MMt, or 2.94 MMbpd, up 7.4% from 11.59 MMt a year earlier, the data showed.
Although South Korea's total crude imports increased last month on-year, its crude imports from Saudi Arabia dropped 30.2% to around 2.7 MMt in October, or 634,876 bpd, from a year ago as the kingdom continues to curb its oil production as part of the OPEC-led supply cut deal to clear global oversupply.
For the first 10 mos of 2017, Korea's crude oil imports climbed 3.8% to 122.95 MMt, or 2.96 MMbpd, compared with 118.44 MMt over the same period last year.
South Korea's final October crude imports data is set to be released by state-run Korea National Oil Corp (KNOC) later this month.
Reporting by Jane Chung; Editing by Joseph Radford
Comments