Top Oil Buyers Rue Global Chaos

The world’s biggest oil buyers are being forced to go on the defensive once again.
US President Donald Trump’s sanctions on Iran and Venezuela, the OPEC+ coalition’s output curbs, and disruptions from Nigeria to Libya are all handing crude sellers the upper hand in negotiations, Bloomberg reported.
With refiners in Asia left competing with each other for limited global quantities on offer, they are being forced to pay more for their favored oil varieties.
That is a shift from just a few months ago, when sellers were kept on their toes as they tried to tackle a flood of US shipments coming east. The change is being reflected in prices for Abu Dhabi’s Murban crude, with cargoes loading in June sold at 25 to 45 cents a barrel above the grade’s official selling price. 
By contrast, the oil fetched discounts during the previous six months as it was weighed down by a glut of comparable supply.
“The strength in the physical market indicates an extremely tight market,” said Virendra Chauhan, a Singapore-based analyst at industry consultant Energy Aspects Ltd., adding that the crunch is likely to last through the third quarter.
“With OPEC keen to avoid last year’s mistakes where they raised supply, buyers will need to pay up before producers raise output.”
It was not so over the past several months, when buyers in Asia benefited from a bigger pool of crude selections as American grades increasingly made their way into the region. 
The added ample supplies had pushed spot prices down in the physical market. However, Trump’s decision to end sanctions waivers for Iranian oil buyers and the de-facto ban on Venezuelan supply has turned the tide in the market.