US gasoline stocks fell 2.3 million barrels in the week ended 26 June and sit 7% below the five-year average, even as distillate built in the same report, the EIA said. RBOB gasoline futures, the US petrol benchmark, carried a managed-money net long of 71,095 contracts into 23 June, and Fujairah light distillates hit their record low the same week.1
Into US and Northern Hemisphere driving season, gasoline draws down while diesel refills, pushing the two product cracks in opposite directions. A refiner maximising middle distillate feeds the diesel rebuild that threatens the gasoil crack, while the gasoline it under-produces tightens further, which is why RBOB length has built.
The cleaner expression than either crack against a falling crude is the inter-product spread: long the gasoline crack, short the gasoil crack. Gasoline draws and diesel refills, on both sides of the Atlantic, in the same week.
