* Shell's revised trading terms move into line with Platts
* Effort aimed at bolstering Brent oil benchmark
* No immediate comment from BP which backed Shell plans
By Alex Lawler
LONDON, March 20 (Reuters) - Royal Dutch Shell hasendorsed changes announced by oil pricing agency Platts to theway it assesses the Brent crude oil market, avoiding a splitwhich could have weakened the benchmark used to set oil pricesglobally.
Brent, based on four types of North Sea crude, sets theprice of billions of dollars of daily oil trade. Since thesecrudes are in dwindling supply, critics say the smaller marketis prone to manipulation and can lead to higher global prices.
Shell and Platts, a unit of McGraw-Hill, had putforward different reform proposals and the prospect of rivalstandards led to concern about a split in liquidity which woulddamage the Brent benchmark rather than fix it.
With effect from Wednesday, Shell updated its "SUKO 90"terms and conditions for Brent oil trading to bring them intoline with plans unveiled on Friday by Platts, which providesclients with energy price benchmarks.
"Shell has further updated its SUKO 90 terms and conditionsto reflect the consensus reached in the market since wepublished our proposed changes on 8 February 2013," Shell saidin an emailed statement.
BP Plc, which had backed the Shell proposals, and Plattscould not immediately be reached for comment. However, North Seatraders had expected the market to adopt the Platts proposals. "My reading is we're now fully aligned," said a person close tothe process.
QUALITY PREMIUMS
The Brent reform arises as the efficiency and transparencyof a wide range of other benchmarks in financial and commoditymarkets have come under the spotlight.
In oil, part of the problem is that traders most oftendeliver the cheapest and lowest quality of the four crudestreams into the Brent-Forties-Oseberg-Ekofisk (BFOE) forwardcontracts that help establish the price of dated Brent, which isused to price oil around the world.
Platts on Friday said it would apply quality premiums forOseberg and Ekofisk crude delivered into BFOEcontracts from June 2013. The buyer will pay the premium to theseller.
The tweak, it is hoped, will offer an incentive for moredeliveries of bettter-quality Oseberg and Ekofisk into BFOEcontracts, effectively increasing the supply of oil underpinningthe market. At present, Forties most often tends to be deliveredas it is of lower quality and usually the cheapest.
Shell, the custodian of the SUKO 90 terms which governtrading of BFOE contracts, speeded up industry talks on addding quality premiums with its Feb. 8 revision to the contract terms.Platts responded with its own proposals on Feb. 18 and consultedthe industry for the next four weeks before announcing itschanges on Friday.
Until Shell's latest changes to SUKO 90, Platts and Shelldiffered on issues including the size of the premium to apply toOseberg crude, whether to apply one to Brent crude and how muchpast price data to use in calculating the premium.
Both now set quality premiums for Oseberg at 50 percent,draw on two months of price data weighed in the same way and -as Platts had proposed - do not apply a premium to Brent.
Forward BFOE and dated Brent underpin Brent crude futures, increasingly seen as the standard global price of oil.
Thomson Reuters, parent of Reuters news, competeswith Platts in providing news and information to the oil market.