Sanctions on Russian oil have forced European refiners to buy more crude closer to home and further afield, while Russian oil now has to bypass Europe and attract more customers in Asia. Both forces have pushed Europe’s aging Brent to a whopping premium of $10 per barrel and Russia’s Urals to a steep discount of $35 per barrel – and with it spreads that were as high as $3 per barrel in stressed times before the start of the Ukraine war in February. blown up. The distortions seem inevitably amplified when…
