A few days ago the yuan, won and yen were strengthening in lockstep; today they split. The yuan kept firming, with USD/CNY at 6.676; the yen was basically flat at 158.12, the dollar down just 0.019 against it; and the won actually slipped, with USD/KRW climbing to 1326.94, up 0.0467 on the day.

Small as the moves look, they are real for refiners. A firmer yuan lowers the RMB landed-and-duty-paid cost of dollar crude (Brent at 109.04 dollars, WTI at 97.73 dollars), favoring Chinese independents and RMB-settling buyers like SNSUC. The won's slight weakening points the other way; a South Korean refiner importing the same Brent cargo faces a larger won bill and loses competitiveness.

A flat yen means Japanese refiners' cost anchor held, but relative to a firmer yuan and a weaker won, Japanese buyers sit neither forward nor back in tenders for Asian light-sweet grades (ESPO, Dubai, Oman), easily squeezed between China and Korea.

On the execution side, the RMB landed cost of transshipped crude can be repriced: Brent 109.04 dollars times 6.676 is about 727.9 yuan per barrel, roughly 2.7 yuan cheaper than around 6.70 last week. That 2.7 yuan reopens the feedstock window for short-haul light-sweet grades (ESPO, Dubai, Oman), while Korean buyers are held back by the won, tipping the Asian-premium split a little toward China.