Large quantities of Russian oil have been stuck in the Red Sea due to Moscow's difficulty finding buyers for this amount of shipments.

The main reason for the glut in supplies has not been identified yet, other than the United States and its allies tightening sanctions on Russian oil in the previous months, and blacklisting a group of ships belonging to brokers and individuals, and some of these ships belong to the state-owned Russian oil tanker operator “Sovcomflot.” " (Sovcomflot).

The average shipments stuck in the Red Sea recorded their highest levels since at least 2017. The average shipments stuck in the Red Sea during the 10 days that ended on March 17 reached 6.2 million barrels of diesel, according to data issued by the analytics company Kpler.

The accumulation of shipments greatly exceeds the same accumulation that occurred during the pandemic, exceeding the levels recorded in 2023, when sanctions preventing shipments from entering the European Union entered into force.

It is unlikely that excess oil production is the reason behind the glut of stranded shipments in the Red Sea. This is due to Ukraine targeting Russian refineries with drones, which would hinder its ability to produce fuel.