SINGAPORE, April 2 (Reuters) - The Asia-Pacific sweet crude market was slightly higher on Monday following firm demand within the region, trade sources said.
MALAYSIA
* Malaysia has raised the official selling price of a basket of March-loading Malaysian crude oil grades to $69.95 a barrel, state oil firm Petronas said in a document seen by Reuters on Monday. March price for the basket of Malaysian crude oil, which includes Labuan, Miri Light, Kikeh and Kimanis Blend crude oil, rose 56 cents per barrel.
* Malaysia's Petronas sold its May 24-May 30-loading Penara Blend crude oil cargo to a Thai refiner at a premium of about $1.40 to $1.60 a barrel to dated Brent, trade sources said.
VIETNAM
* Vietnam's PV Oil may have sold its May-loading Bunga Kekwa and Bunga Orkid cargoes at a premium of about $3 a barrel to dated Brent, traders said, though this could not immediately be confirmed.
* PV Oil also likely sold its Bach Ho light crude oil cargo to Japan's Idemitsu and its Bach Ho heavy crude oil cargo to Ampol, traders said, though this could not immediately be confirmed.
* The cargoes likely sold at $3 to $3.50 a barrel to dated Brent, the traders said.
* Idemitsu has been turning towards buying more of sweet crude grades following the extensive shutdown of its secondary unit at Aichi refinery, traders said. PV Oil could also have sold a Thang Long crude oil cargo to its subsidiary in Singapore at a premium of about $1 a barrel to dated Brent, traders said.
* The tenders by the Vietnamese company are valid until April 2.
CONDENSATE: Hyundai Oilbank Corp has bought its first ever Norwegian condensate cargo as it sought supplies from outside Asia to replace Iranian barrels, two sources said. Oilbank bought 700,000 barrels of Ormen Lange condensate from Statoil (OL:STL) for delivery in June, the sources said.
The National Iranian Oil Company has cut supplies of South Pars condensate to South Korea by 3 million barrels each month from the start of this year, three sources said, as production dropped and as the country started operations of a new splitter.
Still, the tight supply situation could improve for Hyundai Oilbank in the fourth quarter as the refiner will be able to process light crude in addition to condensate, the sources said.
The company plans to shut its 130,000 barrels-per-day splitter in Daesan in September for maintenance for nearly a month, they said.
BRENT-DUBAI EFS
* Brent's premium to Dubai swaps DUB-EFS-1M was at $3.85 per barrel on Monday for June.
NEWS
* China is taking its first steps towards paying for imported crude oil in yuan instead of the U.S. dollar, three people with knowledge of the matter told Reuters, a key development in Beijing's efforts to establish its currency internationally. U.S. crude production rose by 6,000 barrels per day (bpd) in January to 9.964 million barrels per day, the Energy Information Administration said in a monthly report on Friday. Iraq plans to award oil and gas exploration and development contracts in 11 new blocks on April 15, oil ministry spokesman Asim Jihad said on Sunday. Bahrain said on Sunday it had discovered the country's largest oilfield in decades, located off the west coast of the kingdom, according to state news agency BNA. Japan's crude oil imports last month fell 15.4 percent from a year earlier to 2.99 million barrels per day (13.33 million kilolitres), the lowest for the month of February since 1969, monthly data from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) showed on Friday. A liquefied natural gas (LNG) tanker has docked at ExxonMobil's Papua New Guinea export plant, which has been shut since late February following a powerful earthquake, indicating that the facility is preparing to resume shipments. Tighter Asian supplies of naphtha have driven price premiums for the petroleum product to over 12 weeks highs, offsetting the loss of demand caused by the rising use liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) as an alternative. crude prices, oil product cracks and refining margins, please click on the RICs below.
Brent
BRENTSGMc1
Dubai
DUBSGSWMc2
Brent/Dubai EFS
DUB-EFS-1M
PRODUCT CRACKS
Fuel oil crack
FO180SGCKMc1
Gasoil crack
GOSGCKMc1
Naphtha crack
NAFOBSGCKMc1
Complex refining margins REF/MARGIN1