They said a 200,000 barrels of March Indonesian Widuri crude was heard bought by a Japanese refiner at a premium of around 80 cents per barrel to the Indonesian Crude Price (ICP).

This compares to the last trade done around 70/75 cents over the ICP.

No new trades of Minas were heard, with traders assessing spot premiums steady at the 57/58 level to ICP.

The firm premiums of Asian and Middle East crudes coupled with tight availabilities were prompting refiners to look once again at arbitrage crudes, traders said.

They said apart from a VLCC of Brent that Chinese trader Unipec had bought from a U.S. Trade, very large crude carrier (VLCC) of Palanca and another West African grade had also been sold to China recently, although price details were unclear.

Traders said Indonesia was still looking to buy West African crudes, but no deal was confirmed concluded.

There was talk Indonesia may have already bought Qua Iboe but traders were doubtful the trade had been concluded.