RECORDER REPORT

ISLAMABAD: The Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra), on Wednesday, increased the LNG provisional prices for consumers of both gas utility companies for the month of April.

The regulator increased the prices of LNG for gas consumers of the Sui Northern Gas Company Limited (SNGPL) by $0.1733 per mmbtu and the Sui Southern Gas Company Limited (SSGCL) by $0.1634 per mmbtu as compared with prices of LNG for March.

The distribution price of LNG for the SNGPL is fixed $9.7638 per mmbtu for April which was $9.5905 per mmbtu in March.

For the consumers of the SSGCL, the price of LNG is $9.4779 per mmbtu which recorded $9.3145 per mmbtu in March.

Twelve LNG cargoes were imported by the Pakistan State Oil (PSO) and the Pakistan LNG Ltd (PLL) for the month of April.

The PSO imported LNG cargo at $8.2723 per DES price per mmbtu under long-term Qatar agreement and PLL spot purchased LNG at $6.8343 Des per mmbtu.

In latest development, the PLL on March 22 invited bids for delivery of eight cargoes for April-May-June period and set the deadline of March 30 PLL reduced the time between bid evaluation and award of the contracts.

The PLL had also asked the bidders to offer their bids in fixed dollar price instead of slope linked to Brent crude price.

The Federal Cabinet had granted partial exemption to the PLL from Rule-35 of the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (PPRA) rules by relaxing the period between announcement of evaluation report and award of tenders for spot cargoes.

More than half of Pakistan’s total LNG imports are based on long-term contracts, while the rest of the required quantities are met through spot tenders.