Dangote fuel pricey despite crude oil crash – S&P Global

The pricing of refined petroleum products at the Dangote Petroleum Refinery has been identified as one of the incentives to import these products into Nigeria.

S&P Global said in a report that the Dangote refinery’s reduction in petroleum products’ prices was not significant compared to the global fall in prices.

The PUNCH recalls that the Dangote refinery has effected several petrol price cuts, creating a price war among players in the downstream sector.

From about N1,100 per litre in September, the refinery succeeded in slashing the price of petrol to N860 in March, before the price rose again due to the suspension of the naira-for-crude deal.

However, S&P Global said the 650,000 barrels per day capacity refinery did not lower its gantry prices significantly, thereby incentivising fuel imports.

“Incentives to ship products to West Africa have also come from the pricing at Nigeria’s Dangote refinery. While flat prices have been driven down massively amid falling crude prices, Dangote has not lowered gantry prices for truck volumes significantly.

“Between April 1 and April 9, the Eurobob M1 swap fell from $734.25 per metric tonne to $603/MT, a 17.9 per cent fall, before recovering somewhat. But over the same period, Dangote’s truck price at the gantry dropped just 1.7 per cent from N880/litre to N865/litre, according to reporting from the MEMAN retail organisation.

“This has encouraged a flood of products to West Africa, where high domestic prices have led marketers to import from international traders in greater volumes,” the report said.

On Wednesday, the Dangote refinery dropped the gantry price of petrol to N835, asking its partners to sell at N890 in Lagos.

“High-quality Dangote petrol will now be available at the following prices across all our partner retail outlets: Key partners, including MRS, AP (Ardova), Heyden, Optima Energy, Hyde, and Techno Oil, will offer petrol at N890 per litre, down from N920 in Lagos.

“In the South-West, the price will be N900 per litre, reduced from N930. In the North-West and North-Central, the price will be N910 per litre, lowered from N940. In the South-East, South-South, and North-East, the price will be N920 per litre, down from N950,” the company said in a statement on Wednesday.

Our correspondent, who visited some filling stations in Ogun and Lagos states, observed that other filling stations have brought down petrol prices, signalling a new round of competition.

SGR, an independent retailer with four filling stations in Mowe and Sagamu, dropped its price to N878, selling at a rate below that of the Dangote refinery.

It was observed that Heyden now sells petrol for N885 per litre while MRS sells at N890. Some partners of the refinery still sell the product around N920 and N910 a litre; the same in filling stations owned by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited.

A source familiar with developments at the $20bn Lekki-based refinery, who pleaded anonymity due to lack of authorisation to speak on the matter, told our correspondent that the President of the Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote, had since last month planned to announce a significant petrol price drop on his 68th birthday, which was on Thursday.

However, the source said the plan could not materialise as planned due to the break in the naira-for-crude deal.

According to the source, the full implementation of the naira-for-crude deal and the current crash in crude prices will give Dangote another opportunity to drop prices and make petrol available at an affordable rate.

He added that importers of Premium Motor Spirit were the ones kicking against the naira transaction to continue their importation of fuel.

“Alhaji was planning a massive price cut on his birthday, April 10, but that could not happen because of the suspension of the naira-for-crude policy. Nevertheless, he was still able to do something, though marginally.

“Now that the Federal Government has returned the naira-for-crude policy fully and the crude prices are crashing, the competition has returned. I can tell you that the Dangote refinery is planning to crash the price of petrol and make it affordable for the masses,” the source said.

Meanwhile, S&P Global disclosed that threats of further tariffs from the United States and an ongoing arbitrage to West Africa have led to an unseasonal shift in European gasoline export flows.

“Typically, the summer driving season sees increased flows from Europe to the US Atlantic Coast amid an uptick in summer driving demand. At the same time, specification differences between Europe and WAF, which exist in the summer, disappear in the winter, typically resulting in fewer volumes fixed to Nigeria.

“The threat of tariffs and changes in Nigeria’s refining landscape has seen this trend flip in 2025. Large volumes are presently set to arrive in West Africa’s Offshore Lome hub, while the USAC has been demanding more limited flows amid demand-side fears and tariff threats,” it was reported.

According to ship-tracking data from S&P Global Commodities at Sea, 4 million mt of petrol is projected to be delivered into West Africa from all locations over the 30-day period to April 27, a high not seen in over two years.

It was added that material that otherwise would flow to the USAC has instead recently been exported to West Africa, amid a workable arbitrage and strong Nigerian imports.

The PUNCH reports that traders imported 156.897 million litres of petrol within eight days, from April 8 to 16.

On Tuesday, the Chief Executive of the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority, Farouk Ahmed, disclosed that imports of Premium Motor Spirit have plunged from 44.6 million litres per day in August 2024 to 14.7 million litres in April 2025.

Recall that the Dangote refinery is still in court challenging the decision of the NMDPRA to issue import licences to marketers.