OREANDA-NEWS On Monday, November 19, Rosneft will return to the sale of gasoline and diesel fuel at the St. Petersburg international commodity exchange.

The government's decision to abandon the sale of motor fuel on the stock exchange were described as a "demarche". Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak and the head of Rosneft Igor Sechin already agreed on November 16 to return the company to the stock exchange.

Dmitry Kozak's representative declined to comment. Press Secretary of Rosneft Mikhail Leontiev did not answer the question about the return of the company to the stock exchange, but said that "there was no fundamental decision to leave the exchange." "The company has no obligation to sell fuel on the stock exchange on a daily basis," he said. Mikhail Leontiev stressed that Rosneft wants to change the situation on the stock exchange and regulators are already taking steps towards it.

According to media, Kozak instructed to tighten the requirements for trading participants — to increase clearing payments for traders, penalties for termination of transactions and payments for high-frequency trading. The proposals may be considered by the Council of the petroleum products section of SPIMEX on 20 November.

After the decision of Rosneft to leave the stock exchange, the head of the Crimea Sergey Aksenov wrote a letter to Dmitry Kozak, reporting the risk of gasoline shortage on the Peninsula, the newspaper writes. He asked to consider the possibility of over-the-counter fuel contracts. Because of sanctions of the USA and the European Union in the region there are no gas stations of large oilmen therefore the Peninsula receives fuel, buying it on the exchange. Most of the fuel is supplied from Rosneft plants because of their location. The press service of the head of the Crimea newspaper confirmed the existence of the letter. Since we do not have vertically integrated structures [in the fuel market], we ask for this," the head of the press service of the head of the Crimea Ekaterina Nemchinova told the newspaper.

Rosneft stopped the sale of gasoline and diesel fuel on the exchange on November 15 and 16. On November 16, prices for all types of fuel increased. The President of the Independent fuel Union Pavel Bazhenov linked the price increase with the departure of Rosneft from it. The company explained this decision by the opportunity to "achieve transparency of transactions and market pricing" on the stock exchange.