The Philippines is solidifying its status as the next major regional importer of gasoline, with the country's imports of gasoline slated to rise in 2021 on better oil products import infrastructure and lower domestic supply of refined products. The expectations come as the last domestic refinery, Petron's 180,000 b/d Bataan plant, is slated to suspend operations temporarily from mid-January 2021 on weak refining margins, S&P Global Platts reported previously. The Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp. had also shut its 110,000 b/d Tabangao refinery in July, with the facility turned into an import site. Together with the company's North Mindanao Import Facility, the two units have ensured steady domestic supply to the Philippines' Visayas and Mindanao regions. Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp. also opened a new oil import facility at Subic on Nov. 30 -- the company's third oil import terminal in the Philippines -- capable of receiving 54 million liters of oil products from MR tankers, according to a previous statement by the company. "With more import terminals, there naturally will be more movements of gasoline into the country moving forward. I believe that they [the Philippines] will play a larger role in determining market fundamentals in the future, given that they have an obvious lack of domestic refining capacity," one Singapore-based market source said. Echoing this sentiment, another Philippines-based trader said "right now, imports are already rising because there is not enough production in the country to supply domestically. And this is even with demand still not at pre-pandemic levels yet."
RISING IMPORT VOLUMES
Import volumes for delivery to the Philippines had started to rise in the second half of 2020, with spot tenders from Ampol and Petron becoming increasingly common. Australia's Ampol has emerged as a new consistent buyer of gasoline on the spot market, having sought the delivery of 365,000 barrels in December as well as 505,000 barrels for January 2021 delivery, according to public tenders seen by Platts. The company had also previously sought 580,000 barrels of 88 RON gasoline for the October delivery cycle, Platts reported previously. Ampol has some market share in the Philippines domestic market, following the signing of a strategic partnership agreement with the Philippines-based company Seaoil in December 2017. Meanwhile, Petron Singapore, which typically purchases cargoes for the Philippines, was also heard having sought 200,000 barrels of 87 RON gasoline for Dec. 20-22 delivery, industry sources said, although the company subsequently withdrew the tender. Platts could not verify the reason for the tender cancelation with Petron. Further showing the sharp uptick in cargo demand from the Philippines, Chinese gasoline exports to the Philippines surged 150.1% year on year at 147,000 mt in November, according to latest data from the Chinese General Administration of Customs, or GAC. The Philippines took in a total of 252,000 mt of gasoline from China in October, a 141.4% rise from the previous year, GAC data also showed. China's gasoline exports to the Philippines surged 434.1% at 1.7 million mt in January-November, the data showed.