Japan's gasoline imports are expected to stay elevated through August after rising 20% in June as outages at its refineries are reducing output during peak summer demand season, traders and analysts said.
Import demand from Japan will further tighten supplies in Asia and support refiners' gasoline margins which have rebounded to two-month highs earlier in July.
Japan's gasoline imports in June rose to 476,630 kiloliters, up 20.4% from the previous month, data from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) showed on Wednesday.