Med Crude-Urals Rallies in the Baltic in Surgut Tender

Russian Urals crude ended the week on a strong note in the Baltic with oil firm Surgut allocating two cargoes loading in mid-September at almost $1 per barrel stronger than prices at the start of the week.

Surgut awarded 200,000 tonnes of Urals to Shell in a spot tender for lifting from the Baltic Sea port of Ust-Luga on Sept. 18-19 and from the nearby Primorsk on Sept. 19-20 at around dated Brent minus $1.0 a barrel, traders said.

That was some 25 cents a barrel stronger than price estimates on Thursday and $1 stronger than at the beginning of the week.

In the Mediterranean, Litasco offered a Sept. 10-14 Aframax Urals cargo at dated Brent minus 70 cents, some 25 cents weaker than its own bid for slightly different dates earlier in the week, traders said.

To see the list of Russian Urals crude seaborne cargoes primary allocations in September, according to trading sources, see

A trader with a major said he thought the Urals market might have reached an equilibrium and would remain range-bound next week as a lot of initial September spot sales had been already done and oil major Rosneft had allocated this week its six-month tender to the same usual buyers - Eni, Shell and Total.

"That means the main players will stay the same," he said.

Azeri Light might come under new pressure from rising Libyan supplies although it is unlikely to weaken much further as it is already trading near a multi-year low, he said.

(Reporting by Dmitry Zhdannikov and Gleb Gorodyankin; Editing by Pravin Char)