Russia

In der Saison 2023/24 exportierte Russland mindestens 72 Millionen Tonnen Getreide und richtet nun seinen Blick auf neue Märkte in Lateinamerika und Afrika. Diese Diversifizierungsstrategie weicht von den traditionellen Getreidemärkten in Nordafrika und dem Nahen Osten ab.¹⁾

Russia is one of the world’s largest exporters of refined oil products.²⁾

Russia on average refines more than 5 million barrels of oil a day, far outstripping domestic demand, allowing it to cut exports in the face of a fuel price spike.³⁾

Overall, Russia has a refining capacity of about 6.5 million barrels a day, according to the Britain-based Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, so it can use this spare capacity to absorb shutdowns. It also has the option of pushing back seasonal maintenance at some refineries if others are knocked offline.⁴⁾

Russia can also export more crude in lieu of refined products, offsetting revenue losses.⁵⁾

Moscow has long argued that freezing weather and other geological conditions make it more difficult to curb production in the first few months of the year. ``We did try,’’ Prince Abdulaziz said at the time ``We also know it’s extremely tough for Russia to cut production in the winter.’’⁶⁾

Russia produces about 6% of global nickel, 5% of aluminum, and 4% of copper.⁷⁾

Sanctions are beginning to have an impact, according to a CREA briefing in January. Oil and gas trades account for 40 per cent of Russia’s federal budget but a combination of the EU ban and price cap, and a significant drop in global prices, saw its December revenues slump to February 2022 levels.⁸⁾

Between 2018 and 2023 just 20% of the total contribution of hydrocarbon exports to the Russian budgetcame from gas, and despite sanctions Russia continues to sell lots of oil at a good price.⁹⁾

The gas Russia feeds its main liquefaction terminals is cheaper than any exporter bar Qatar, and liquefaction works well in the cold.¹⁰⁾

Russland sei führend bei den Reserven einer Reihe strategischer Rohstoffe, so Putin – etwa bei Erdgas, von dem fast 22 % der weltweiten Reserven auf Russland entfielen. Bei Gold liege der Anteil der russischen Reserven bei fast 23 %, bei Diamanten bei annähernd 55 %. https://de.investing.com/analysis/russland-pruft-exportbeschrankungen-fur-rohstoffe-200493113 ¹¹⁾

Russland ist außerdem der viertgrößte Uranproduzent der Welt. Das Land verfügt über etwa 44 % der weltweiten Urananreicherungskapazität. Im August hatten die USA ein Gesetz zum Verbot russischen Urans erlassen. Uran aus Russland deckte im vergangenen Jahr 12 % der Gesamtlieferungen an US-Versorger ab. https://de.investing.com/analysis/russland-pruft-exportbeschrankungen-fur-rohstoffe-200493113 ¹²⁾

Russia was always going to struggle to redirect the 180bn cubic metres (bcm) of gas, worth 80% of its total exports of the fuel in 2021, that it once sold to Europe. The country has no equivalent to Nord Stream, a conduit to Germany, that allows it to pipe gas to customers elsewhere.¹³⁾

The package bans the re-exports of Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) in EU waters but stops short of prohibiting imports, as was done for Russian seaborne oil in 2022. Some EU nations continue to import pipeline gas from Russia via Ukraine.¹⁴⁾

Experts in the gas market suggest that the measure will have minimal impact, as trans-shipments of gas via EU ports to Asia account for only about 10% of Russia’s total LNG exports.¹⁵⁾

Auch bei Titan spielt Russland als drittgrößter Produzent von Titanschwamm eine gewisse Rolle, wenngleich die Mineralreserven begrenzt sind. Das russische Unternehmen VSMPO-AVISMA zählt neben dem US-Unternehmen ATI zu den wichtigsten Herstellern von Titanschwamm für die Luft- und Raumfahrt auf dem europäischen und amerikanischen Markt. https://de.investing.com/analysis/russland-pruft-exportbeschrankungen-fur-rohstoffe-200493113 ¹⁶⁾

This is because Russia is the world’s second-largest refined class 1 nickel producer after China, and class 1 nickel is currently the only type deliverable on the LME.¹⁷⁾

In 2022, the number of Suezmax tankers changing owners doubled compared to 2021, reaching 103, while Aframax sales rose by 30 percent, to 121. (Suezmax and Aframax tankers are the third- and fourth-largest types of crude oil carriers, respectively.) These ship types are “the ship size of choice for moving Russian cargoes,” a shipping executive told S&P Global Commodities Insight, because “not all ports in Russia can berth bigger ships.”¹⁸⁾

Russia is a key exporter of middle distillates, fuel oil and naphtha.¹⁹⁾

Helima Croft, a former CIA analyst now at RBC Capital Markets, recently noted that Ukraine had shown it could strike most of the oil export infrastructure in western Russia, putting about 60 per cent of the country’s exports at risk.²⁰⁾

Recent local media reports suggest that Russia has approved a six-month ban on the exports of gasoline starting from 1 March 2024. However, the ban does not apply to gasoline exports to the Eurasian Economic Union, Mongolia and Uzbekistan. The move came as the domestic market will soon see increased demand due to spring field work, repairs at refineries and summer holidays. However, the announcement is not expected to have a large impact on the global gasoline market as Russia consumes most of the gasoline it produces.

• Turkey is a prime buyer of Russian wheat^{21) 22)}
• Russia is the world’s top wheat exporter and Novorossiysk ranks as one of the main shipment points.
• Prior to Russia’s invasion, Ukraine played a vital role in feeding 400 million people globally and accounted for 8 to 10% of global wheat exports, as well as 10 to 12% of corn and barley exports.

However, none of them wanted to withdraw completely from the Russian market, because Russia, being the largest wheat exporter, is too relevant for global food security. Meanwhile, the Russian state tried to increase its control over its grain exports, making it increasingly difficult for foreign companies to obtain the documents required to export their own grain. In addition, the Russian government threatened to nationalise foreign subsidiaries if companies were unwilling to sell them (often below value).²³⁾

Anne-Marie Trevelyan, a foreign office minister with responsibility for sanctions, said in a Linkedin post that the UK was announcing “new measures which will disrupt Putin’s ability to supply and fund his war machine,” including “a ban on the import of Russian metals and diamonds, Russia’s largest export sectors after oil and gas.”

The main importers of durum in the new season should be Tunisia and Algeria, where Russian soft wheat is already sold.

Russia is a major producer of aluminum, copper and zinc.

With Russia the world's second-biggest exporter of diesel behind the US, the impact on the already tight middle distillates markets was marked.

Somit könnten die Exporte des drittgrössten Ölproduzenten der Welt ernsthaft beeinträchtigt werden, denn vor dem Krieg in der Ukraine wurden 60 % des russischen Rohöls von europäischen, meist griechischen Schiffen transpor- tiert und in drei Vierteln der Fälle von britischen oder norwegischen Unternehmen versichert.

Russia typically exports about a million barrels-a-day of diesel-type fuel, making it one of the world’s top suppliers.²⁴⁾

Before the Ukraine war, Russia supplied less than 1 per cent of India’s crude. It now accounts for about 30 per cent, according to official trade statistics. ²⁵⁾

Nov'23: Russia is a fairly small exporter of diesel, exporting less than 5m tonnes last year.

Sept'23: Noting that the Russian ban comes at a time when exports of gasoil/diesel normally fall due to higher domestic demand during the autumn harvest, analysts at S&P Global said the ban highlights Russia's track record for tightening markets for local benefit via higher prices and revenues.

Sept'23: Russia plays an important role in the global diesel market. So far this year, the nation was the world’s single biggest seaborne exporter of diesel-type fuel, narrowly ahead of the US, according to Vortexa data compiled by Bloomberg. It shipped more than 1 million barrels a day from January to mid-September.

Sept'23: Officially, the nation expects to produce over 90 million tons of the fuel this year — equivalent to about 1.9 million barrels a day — and consumes just 40 million tons out of the total, leaving the rest for exports, according to data from Pavel Zavalny, head of the energy committee in Russia’s lower chamber of the parliament.

Sept'23: Extending the measure beyond early October would damage the nation’s oil industry, a person familiar with the situation said. Russian refineries would need to cut their runs to avoid overstocking as free storage space would run out. That makes an ending of the ban in early October plausible, the person said.

Russia’s Black Sea terminals handle about 70% of the country’s grain exports. They include the Novorossiisk and Taman ports.

Russia gets around a third of its budget revenues from the oil and gas industry

The distance from Moscow to Vladivostok is eight times greater than the distance to the country’s EU borders, underscoring the scale of the logistical challenge.

However, Indian Oil is the only refiner that has a term deal with state-run Rosneft (ROSN) to make long term purchases. Europe raised concerns over a Rosneft crude-carrying ship due to which State Bank of India refused to process the payment even though the crude was below the price cap. This forced Indian Oil to arrange for alternative payment in yuan via another bank, the official said. Such issues have impacted decision of other state firms from entering into long-term deals with Russia for crude imports.

Russia can juggle between sending crude abroad and processing it at home

Black Sea winter #wheat has been *a bit* dry in recent weeks…it could become a problem for Russian South, a key growing region, if things won't improve during the next several weeks

The country doesn’t have the capacity to store oil on a large scale, so if companies can’t sell what they produce because of Western restrictions the system can quickly become backed up.

Russia, which gets around a third of it budget revenues from oil and gas industry, is changing the way it calculates taxes on oil, adopting a narrower discount on the Urals grade used in its assessments.

Neither does the rest of the world, even though Russia is, by far, the world’s largest exporter of wheat, making it a vital contributor to global food security. The country is also a giant producer of corn, barley and sunflower seed.

Bloomberg 2023

A huge chunk of Russia’s seaborne flows to China is comprised of ESPO Blend, a higher-quality grade typically priced above the $60 a barrel cap. Due to its consistently-high price, exports of the grade from ports in eastern Russia already rely on the shadow fleet and insurers willing to handle such trades.

Russia, ranked seventh in copper production, faces an expected decline in production due to the ongoing war in Ukraine.^{26) 27)}