In August alone, maritime deliveries of petroleum products to Russia from overseas exceeded 300,000 tons. It is highly likely that this entire volume, or the overwhelming majority of it, was gasoline. This was the type of fuel in short supply at gas stations (filling stations), leading to long queues. Approximately 160,000 tons were delivered to Murmansk, with the remaining volume going to Baltic ports. Deliveries were made from India, Morocco, and Turkey. There were also reports of Egyptian fuel being delivered to Arkhangelsk and gasoline from South Korea to Vladivostok.
The primary issue with imported gasoline in Russia is its price. All mentioned exporting countries are also importers of crude oil. It cannot be ruled out that the gasoline they sent us was produced from Russian oil. As explained in an interview with "RG" by senior analyst at the analytical center "Yakob and Partners" Victoria Trifonova, imported fuel not only includes the cost of the gasoline itself but also maritime freight, insurance, transshipment, and subsequent transportation within Russia. An additional factor is the infrastructural limitations for receiving, transshipping, and handling petroleum products at Russian ports. For the supplier, selling such gasoline on the exchange means either setting a significantly higher price or selling with insufficient margin.
Indeed, in August, when gasoline trading from overseas took place on the exchange, it was sold at a price of 105,000 rubles per ton, which was 39% higher than the then-current exchange quotes for A-92 (75,530 rubles per ton). Currently, the quotes stand at 69,819 rubles per ton, but it is unlikely that imported gasoline has become cheaper.
However, the absence of exchange trades now and the fact that only slightly more than a thousand tons were traded in August do not mean that Indian or Moroccan gasoline is no longer being sold. For example, in August, Russia imported 188,000 tons of Belarusian gasoline (delivered by rail and road), of which only 26,000 tons passed through the exchange.
Most of the imported maritime fuel is sold under direct contracts, bypassing the exchange, believes Sergey Frolov, managing partner at NEFT Research. Direct deliveries are noticeably increasing: if in August the "First Murmansk Terminal" supplied around 10,000 tons of fuel to the domestic market (directly), then by the end of September, this figure has already exceeded 20,400 tons. This means that fuel is distributed to gas stations—including major oil companies—directly, without public trading, he emphasizes.
If there is no imported gasoline on the exchange, it does not mean it is unavailable in Russia, confirms Dmitry Gusev, deputy chairman of the Supervisory Board of the "Reliable Partner" Association and member of the Expert Council of the "Gas Stations of Russia" competition. The role of exchange trading in Russia has significantly declined; the mandatory sales norms for gasoline via the exchange for major oil companies have been reduced from 15% to 10%, with direct contracts between suppliers and buyers now taking priority. The exchange is currently merely a price benchmark, not reflecting the real state of the market, and its role in price formation is minimal.
There are drawbacks to this situation. As Trifonova points out, the more fuel is distributed through direct contracts, the lower the role of the exchange as a public price indicator, making access to fuel supplies more challenging for independent gas stations (more than half in Russia), which are not owned by major oil companies. This is particularly difficult for smaller networks lacking their own developed logistics. A balance is crucial for the market: the ability to promptly redistribute scarce resources via direct contracts on one hand, and maintaining sufficient transparency and competition on the other, the expert assures.
In the meantime, the government is discussing measures to enhance the attractiveness of imported fuel for our market. A damping mechanism has already been applied to such supplies. This is a subsidy from the budget that compensates importers for part of the difference between indicative wholesale prices (set by the state annually) in Russia and the cost of fuel in external markets. Delivery costs are also taken into account, but only up to the Russian port.
The main supplier of gasoline to Russia from abroad is Belarus.Deputy Finance Minister Alexey Sazanov recently stated that the Ministry of Finance is ready to consider a proposal from the Ministry of Energy to include shipping costs from Russian ports to consumption regions in the calculation of the damping mechanism.
Trifonova believes that accounting for the cost of transporting imported fuel within Russia could significantly improve the economics of such supplies. However, this measure will not return imported fuel to the exchange.
Frolov clarifies that discussions about extending the zero import duty on gasoline until mid-2027 (currently in effect until the end of 2026) are also ongoing. However, the Ministry of Finance does not yet support accounting for the foreign premium (the difference between the purchase price and the exchange indicative), arguing that its size cannot be reliably determined. Thus, the approach is: compensating for logistics within the country—yes, compensating the purchase price abroad—no, the expert emphasizes.
The question remains how critical maritime supplies of imported fuel are for us now. According to Sergey Tereshkin, CEO of Open Oil Market, it can be confidently stated that supplies from India or Turkey currently do not play a significant role. This is their key distinction from supplies from Belarus. The share of Belarusian supplies in Russia's gasoline consumption has increased from 2% to 6%. In some regions, it may be even higher. Building infrastructure for supplies from distant foreign countries is a challenging task. This is especially true now, as global oil refining is at multi-year lows, and underutilization of Middle Eastern refineries has already become one of the reasons for the deficit in the global fuel market.
Source: RG.RU
