Russia's offshore crude oil exports have recovered about half of their decline after suffering a sharp decline in the previous week, although there is growing evidence that sanctions have begun to hinder Moscow's oil supply chain.

This backlash comes after maintenance work on Russia's most important Baltic Sea export terminal was completed, and the storm damage to its main Pacific port eased. According to foreign media data, the earlier shutdown of these ports has caused the average flow of Russian marine crude oil over the past four weeks to be slightly lower than Russia's export target for the first quarter.

The Indian refiner, which became Russia's second-largest oil buyer in the 2022 Russian-Ukrainian conflict, will no longer accept crude oil from Russian state-owned company Sovcomflot PJSC due to concerns about the risks posed by the recent intensification of sanctions. This appears to have caused several ships carrying Russian crude oil to be blocked off the Indian coast, while others were diverted to China.

Furthermore, none of the ships designated by the US Treasury as violating the Group of Seven (G-7) price caps have carried cargo since they were added to the sanctions list. Many ships have turned to the Black Sea, and others are anchored near ports on Russia's Baltic and Pacific coasts.

However, at present, Russia's overall crude oil shipments have not experienced any large-scale decline. In the week ending March 24, the country's crude oil shipments increased by about 360,000 barrels per day. With the number of shadow fleets willing to transport Russian oil has reached at least 600, there are still a large number of ships that can maintain the flow of Russian oil.

The recovery in exports has also boosted Russia's oil revenues. For the week ending March 24, gross profit from Russian crude oil exports recovered half of the previous week's decline, rising from US$1.48 billion to US$1.68 billion for the week ending March 17. The four-week average income also increased, growing by about $15 million a week to $1.62 billion.

Russian crude oil shipments by sea (2023-2024)

Most of Russia's Sokol (Sokol) crude oil stocks, which were previously backlogged due to rejection by Indian refiners, have now been unloaded. All Sokol crude oil cargoes loaded so far this month have gone directly to China. About 8.4 million barrels have arrived at Chinese refineries, of which about 3.5 million barrels have finally returned to India, and another shipment has been delivered to Pakistan. Currently, there are still about 5.5 million barrels of crude oil to be unloaded, and half of this will also be shipped back to India.