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North Sea Crude-Forties steady, Brent inches higher

Reuters - UK Focus

LONDON, March 16 (Reuters) - Forties crude differentials held steady on Thursday in spite of a number of offers for cargoes via ship-to-ship transfer, often a sign of an oversupplied market.

* Brent diffs edged higher after a modestly stronger bid from Glencore (Frankfurt: 8GC.F - news) , but prices remained close to their lowest levels for the year.

* There are more than 5 million barrels of North Sea crude being stored on ships, despite the modest contango in the dated Brent forward curve, but weak aframax rates were helping make storing unsold oil at sea more profitable, according to one shipping source.

* BP said it is in talks with Ineos regarding the potential sale of the Forties Pipeline System. The pipeline's average daily throughput is around 450,000 barrels of oil, roughly 40 percent of the UK production, BP said.

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* The Gener8 Hercules, chartered by Shell (LSE: RDSB.L - news) , has set sail for China with Forties, according to Reuters ship-tracking data, while a second VLCC, the Baltic Glory, chartered by the company and fully laden, is still at anchor off Southwold. Trading sources say the vessel is on hold and its final destination is unclear.

WINDOW SUMMARY

FORTIES/BRENT

* Glencore bid for a cargo of Brent for loading Apr 4-12 at 60 cents below the dated benchmark.

* BP offered a cargo of Forties for loading via STS (Shanghai: 603322.SS - news) at Scapa Flow Apr 1-3 at a premium of 10 cents to dated Brent from the British Kestrel.

* Vitol withdrew an offer for one cargo of Forties for loading via STS at Scapa Flow at a discount of 20 cents to dated Brent from the VLCC Desimi between Mar 28-Apr 2 and withdrew a second cargo from the Trikwong Venture for the same dates at the same price.

EKOFISK

* Glencore bid for a cargo of Ekofisk for loading Apr 2-9 at a discount of 30 cents to dated Brent.

* Gunvor offered a cargo of Ekofisk for loading Apr 3-5 at a discount of 5 cents to dated Brent. (Reporting by Amanda Cooper; Editing by David Goodman and Elaine Hardcastle)