KARA CHI - Oil sales volume during the first month of current financial year increased by 10 per cent to 1.9m tons. According to provisional data released on Monday, the YoY growth in oil sales for the industry was driven by rising demand for Furnace Oil (FO) sales, which soared by 7 per cent, from the power generation sector while reduced price differential with CNG helped Petrol sales rise by 27 per cent. Moreover, HSD sales also witnessed a rebound and stood at 661k tons, showing 9 per cent increase in growth. It further revealed that on a MoM basis, FO sales declined by 4 per cent; however HSD and JP sales witnessed an encouraging rise of 9 per cent and 41 per cent, respectively. It is important to mention here that the Pakistan State Oil recorded growth of 5 per cent MoM and 8 per cent YoY on the back of a pick up in HSD sales. The company managed to improve market share in the product to 59 per cent from 50 per cent last month. APL and SHEL also recorded impressive growth of 38 per cent YoY and 26 per cent YoY, respectively.