Singapore Posts Highest Ever Q1 Bunker Sales as Record Numbers Flock to Buy Fuel

Source: Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore

Singapore has recorded another huge month of bunker sales, the latest preliminary data from the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) shows.

Sales for all products in March totalled 4,149,800 metric tonnes (mt), the port's third highest ever sales total and only the fourth time the world's biggest bunkering port by volume has recorded over 4 million mt in a month, following the 4,287,800 mt, 4,051,200 mt, and 4,164,500 mt sold in August 2015, December 2015, and January 2016 respectively.

The March sales total means Singapore's Q1 total sales volume is 11,824,300 mt, a substantial 11 percent higher than the previous record of 10,653,600 mt set in Q1 2015.

The sales surge seems to be entirely due to an increase in the number of buyers choosing Singapore to load their bunkers - the 3,672 calls for bunkers in March was also a record high, while the average stem size of 1,130 mt for the month is right in the middle of the range of 1,048 mt to 1,210 mt average monthly stem sizes seen over the last 24 months.

The total number of calls for bunkers in Q1 was 10,585, also the highest ever for a quarter.

In terms of individual products, IFO380 was, as usual, the most popular grade in March with 3,130,000 mt sold - a typical 75 percent of the overall total.

Sales of 500 cSt product, the port's second most popular grade, totalled 792,300 mt, or 19 percent of the total for all products.

Perhaps more notable was the 87,500 mt of Emissions Control Area (ECA) compliant LSMGO sales in March, the highest ever in a calendar month and beating the previous high of 84,500 mt sold in January 2016 by some 3.5 percent.

Last month MPA announced the launch of the world's first National Technical Reference for Bunker Mass Flow Metering (MFM), TR48, a precursor to the mandatory use of MFM systems for MFO bunkering in Singapore from January 1, 2017.