Kateryna Mudriian, ASAP Agri Chief Analyst participated at Trend & Hedge Club on 29 May in Kyiv and had a possibility to ask Jonathan Grange from Sunstone Brokers the hottest topics of Ukrainian sunflower oil market.

ASAP: Now we can see that prices for sunoil are fuelling up, for example, ASAP Agri heard today that sellers increase offers to 990 USD/MT CIF Mersin, and there are rumors that some russian sellers were telling even 1000 USD/MT already today. Do you expect this bullish trend, which started in May, to hold on longer? J. Grange: Currently sunflower seed market in the Black Sea region is facing two problems – weather in russia and rapidly reducing volumes of crushing in Ukraine. Dry weather in russia that has already affected the wheat crop, may also hurt the sunflower seed crop, and now it is a significant concern. This may turn into a problem for Ukraine as well, as the lack of rains was observed in the country too. However, for now, weather issue is a minor problem for Ukraine. ASAP: What is the major problem now? How do you asses that volume of sunflower seeds for sale in Ukraine as of 1 of June? J. Grange: What is the most concerning in Ukraine, it is rapidly declining crushing volumes of sunflower seed. In a normal year, there is enough volumes of the sunseed on the market in May, then the volumes start declining in June and the crushing comes to the standstill by mid-August. It seems that this year we are already at the stage of depletion of sunflower seed stocks which will be an issue during the summer. ASAP: If we compare the current season with the previous one, the deliveries of Ukrainian sunoil to China and India plunged by almost three times. In your opinion, what was wrong? Is there any political reason?

J. Grange: It is all about the price, but not the politics. Before the war, Ukrainian shipped large volumes of sunflower oil in big bulkers to India, China. It all collapsed when the war started. Ukraine began selling to Turkey, Egypt in coasters. That took away these markets from russia, which also had to deal with export tax. Ukrainian prices were able to grab those markets. And russia started loading bigger bulkers to India and China.