Benchmarks

Crude cost can be entered directly, or can instead be entered relative to the price of a Benchmark crude. If no Benchmark is set, then the price is used directly as the cost of the crude. If a Benchmark is set, a difference is added/subtracted to the cost of the Benchmark crude before this value is used as the price of the crude.

For example, if Arab Light was set as a benchmark with a cost of $50, and Iran Heavy was set as a differential of +4, then $54 would be used as the cost of Iran Heavy. At a later date, if the cost of Arab Heavy was changed to $70, then the cost of Iran Heavy would automatically increase to $74.