Muscat: Brent crude futures slipped 19 cents, or 0.2%, to $105.64 a barrel by 0347 GMT, while US West Texas Intermediate crude fell 33 cents, or 0.3%, to $102.10. Both benchmarks had dropped around $3 in the previous session.

The decline followed reports that Saudi Arabia is offering additional crude loadings to Asian refiners through ship-to-ship transfers off Oman’s Sohar port. The move is helping offset some of the supply disruption caused by attacks on Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline, a key route carrying crude to the Red Sea.

Saudi Aramco has reportedly offered Arab Light, Arab Medium and Arab Heavy crude grades to Asian term buyers for loading off Sohar. The arrangement provides Saudi Arabia with another route to move crude amid pressure on its traditional export channels.

Analysts, however, said the additional flows are expected to compensate for only part of the lost supply. Saxo Bank analysts noted that increased flows through the Strait of Hormuz were only partly offsetting export barrels affected by the shutdown of the East-West pipeline.

Oil prices had climbed to around four-month highs earlier this week after crude loadings at Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea export hub of Yanbu were suspended and some cargo deliveries to European customers were cancelled following attacks on the pipeline. Two pumping stations serving the route were damaged, with the timeline for repairs remaining uncertain.

Despite Thursday’s decline, concerns over the broader Middle East conflict continue to support oil prices. Saudi airstrikes targeted Yemen while Houthi forces launched drones and missiles towards Saudi cities amid an intensification of hostilities in the region.

Singapore-based DBS Bank said its base-case scenario for the fourth quarter assumes that the US-Iran conflict will ease, allowing Brent crude to stabilise in the $85-to-$95-a-barrel range.