High freight rates limit arbitrage

摘要

The spread between sour Russian Urals crude in northwest Europe and the Mediterranean widened to around US1.20/bl because of an overhang of Baltic-loading cargoes and strong demand in southern Europe.This opened the north-south arbitrage on paper,with Baltic-loading cargoes offered in the Mediterranean for arrival in the first half of November.But high freight rates have made the arbitrage difficult to work.