Growth in global oil demand will ease to around 1.2 million barrels per day (mb/d) in 2016, below the 1.8 mb/d expansion of last year, the newly released IEA Oil Market Report (OMR) for April informs, as notable decelerations take hold across China, the United States and much of Europe. Preliminary data for the first quarter of 2016 reveal that this is already occurring, with year-on-year growth down to 1.2 mb/d, after gains of 1.4 mb/d in the final quarter of 2015 and 2.3 mb/d in the prior quarter.

Global oil supplies sank by 0.3 mb/d in March to 96.1 mb/d, with annual gains shrinking to 0.2 mb/d, from 1.7 mb/d a month earlier and 2.7 mb/d a year earlier. The outlook for non-OPEC production in 2016 is largely unchanged since last month’s OMR, at 57 mb/d, 710 000 barrels per day (710 kb/d) less than the 2015 average.

OPEC crude oil production fell by 90 kb/d in March to 32.47 mb/d as on going outages in Nigeria, the United Arab Emirates and Iraq more than offset a further increase from Iran and higher flows from Angola. Supply from Saudi Arabia dipped in March but held near 10.2 mb/d.

First-quarter global refinery runs are estimated at 79.3 mb/d, 1.2 mb/d higher than in the first quarter of 2015, in line with global demand growth. The forecast for the second quarter throughput is at 79.7 mb/d, up only 0.8 mb/d year-on-year, slower than the forecast 1.1 mb/d demand growth. All of the net growth in the first half of 2016 comes from non-OECD refiners.

Commercial stocks in the OECD built counter-seasonally by 7.3 mb in February to end the month at 3 060 mb. Accordingly, the overhang of inventories against average levels widened to 387 mb at end-month. Preliminary information for March suggests OECD holdings rose further while volumes of crude held in floating storage increased.

The April OMR also features in-depth articles on slowing Chinese production and how the slump in oil prices has affected North Sea projects. Another article available to subscribers details the drop in global gasoil demand while a fourth expands on the March issue’s analysis of refiners’ seasonality challenges.