Vietnam’s top oil products importer Petrolimex is seeking a total of 879,000 tonnes of oil products for first quarter, the company said, adding to earlier January spot market purchases.

The firm issued a tender to buy 302,000 tonnes of fuel oil, 308,000 tonnes of 0.5-per cent sulphur gas oil, 219,000 tonnes of mostly 92-ron gasoline and 50,000 tonnes of kersone.
The tender is valid till January 12.
The fuel oil volume would be 30 per cent below its fourth-quarter purchase due to reduced power demand.
"We are buying less fuel oil this quarter because demand from the power sector has fallen as they are using more natural gas. It remains to be seen if this trend will continue into the next quarter,” a company official said.
For gas oil, all the cargoes sought in the new tender are for February and March, as the firm had earlier bought 150,000 to 180,000 tonnes of the product in the spot market for January.
The firm had cut its fourth-quarter diesel purchases to 316,000 tonnes, 40 per cent lower than the third-quarter tender, due to lofty Asian prices.
The February-March gasoline requirement was down 27 per cent from the 300,000 tonnes purchased in the first quarter last year, when Petrolimex tendered for 257,000 tonnes.
Petrolimex received an annual quota to import at least 6.1 million tonnes of oil products next year, the same as 2005 on expectations of steady demand.
On fuel oil, Petrolimex had already bought three January low-density cargoes last month, all FOB Singapore parcels, from South Korea’s Elico Oil and Vitol Asia at a premium $7.50 a tonne to Singapore spot quotes.
Traders expect transaction levels to be lower-to-stable to those deals due to heavy inflows into East Asia.