The return of heavy Venezuelan barrels, combined with narrowing discounts on Russian Urals, could help Reliance Industries (RIL) rebuild its refining margin premium over domestic peers and add as much as Rs 12,600 crore to annual operating profit, according to YES Securities.
The brokerage estimates that higher Venezuelan crude intake and full optimisation of Jamnagar’s complex could add $2-3 a barrel to Reliance’s blended gross refining margin. On annual crude throughput of about 70 million tonnes, that translates into an estimated Rs 8,400 crore-Rs 12,600 crore increase in annual O2C EBITDA.
