Iraq’s state oil marketer SOMO issued a tender on Thursday offering to sell Basra Heavy and Basra Medium oil in July, trade sources said.
SOMO has not specified volumes in the tender, they said, adding the tender will close on Saturday.
The company is asking buyers to lift oil from its Basra Oil Terminal, inside the Strait of Hormuz.
It is asking bidders to offer prices linked to Dated Brent for supplies to Europe, Argus Sour Crude Index (ASCI) for the United States, and an average of Oman-Dubai for Asia, they said.
SOMO did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent during a national holiday in Iraq.
Pricing terms are in contrast to SOMO’s usual tenders through which it sells only a ‘handful’ of cargos at premium or discounts linked to its official selling price, said one of the sources.
“In this tender they have not specified the volume. This shows they have huge unsold volumes like everyone else in the Middle East,” this source said.
Physical crude oil cargoes are selling at steep discounts around the world, changing trade flows as markets come under pressure from fast-rising Middle Eastern supply, with Iran set to boost sales following a temporary reprieve from U.S. sanctions.
Recently, Abu Dhabi National Oil Company sold at least 48 million barrels of oil through spot tenders after the United Arab Emirates’ departure from the OPEC group.
Iraq, OPEC’s second-largest producer, has considered leaving the producers’ group if Baghdad is not allowed to significantly increase oil production, sources with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.
(Reporting by Nidhi Verma, Additional reporting by Ahmad Ghaddar; Editing by Susan Fenton)