Amendment to how Platts analyses balmo swaps in European fuel oil assessments

S&P Global Platts is amending how it analyses balance month derivatives for consideration of floating price bids, offers and trades in its European fuel oil assessment processes, effective from the July 2020 roll.

Currently, Platts considers the difference between the balance month and front calendar month contracts, or structure, to calculate a forward strip of values reflecting physical loading and delivery dates, up until liquidity in the underlying contract diminishes. This is typically around five calendar days ahead of the end of the month. After that point, Platts uses the M1/M2 structure.

From July 2020, Platts will instead use both balmo/M1 structure and M1/M2 structure on a pro rata basis reflecting the number of calendar days remaining in the current month to arrive at a smoother transition between the two periods. The resulting strip would be used for assessing the outright value of any floating price bids, offers or trades for consideration in fuel oil assessments.

Please send feedback and comments to europe_products@spglobal.com and pricegroup@spglobal.com.

For written comments, please provide a clear indication if comments are not intended for publication by S&P Global Platts for public viewing.

Platts will consider all comments received and will make comments not marked as confidential available upon request.