Korea and Taiwan are the first key crude importers to release comprehensive stats for April. As such the numbers provide a key indication of the extent to which global crude trade flows may be beginning to rebound from the Covid-19 pandemic. The two East Asian economies were among the first to be hit by cases of Covid-19, from January, though neither saw anything like the number of cases (or as extensive a lockdown) as key European economies.
Global number five importer Korea took 2.72mn b/d in April, up a fraction on March’s 2.69mn b/d. For the first four months of 2020 as a whole, imports of 2.84mn b/d are down 8.3% year-on-year. (CONTINUED - 628 WORDS)
