By Charles Kennedy of OilPrice.com
OPEC’s second-largest producer, Iraq, is offering huge discounts of up to $33.40 per barrel off the official selling prices for its crude that has to move through the Strait of Hormuz.
Iraq’s oil production and exports have been severely crippled due to the hostilities in the Middle East and the de facto closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which is the only way to move Iraqi Basrah crude grades.
Iraq was one of the first Gulf producers to slash upstream production and now exports a small part of its crude via a pipeline to the Turkish Mediterranean coast. But its key export port at Basrah, which handled the bulk of exports prior to the war, is constrained due to the unpassable Strait of Hormuz. Iraq has shipped some cargoes eastward out of the Strait thanks to bilateral agreements with Iran’s forces, but tankers now have to move empty westward of the Strait and travel deep into the Persian Gulf to load from Basrah.
The inbound movement at the Strait of Hormuz is at a standstill, and renewed tensions, blockades, the U.S. Project Freedom to guide ships, the Iranian threats to said project, and Iranian expansion of the area of control at Hormuz are further complicating tanker movement west into the Persian Gulf.
Iraq is now offering a discount of $33.40 per barrel off the official selling price of its flagship Basrah Medium crude loading from Basrah on the Gulf in May, Bloomberg News reported on Tuesday, citing a May 3 notice by Iraqi state oil marketing company SOMO.
Basrah Medium that would be loaded between May 1 and 10 would be priced at a discount of $33.40 a barrel below the OSP, and at a $26-per-barrel discount between May 11 and 31, according to the notice seen by Bloomberg.
Basrah Heavy for loading in May is being offered to buyers at $30 below the OSP.
If a buyer agrees to some of the offers, SOMO’s notice says that “force majeure shall not be applicable to this offer, given that it has been issued under existing exceptional conditions already known to all parties.”