India's IOC buys 7 MMbbl of U.S., Middle East crude after Russian oil pause
Indian Oil Corp (IOC), the country's top refiner, has bought 7 MMbbl of September-arrival crude from the United States, Canada and the Middle East via a tender, several trade sources said on Monday.
IOC's large spot crude purchase comes after the arbitrage window for U.S. crude to Asia opened and as Indian state refiners paused buying of Russian crude oil on narrowing discounts. U.S. President Donald Trump has warned countries not to purchase oil from Moscow, which is under sanctions over its February 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
IOC bought 4.5 MMbbl of U.S. crude, 500,000 bbl of Canada's Western Canadian Select (WCS) and 2 MMbbl of Das oil produced in Abu Dhabi, the sources said. They declined to be named because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
The higher-than-normal purchases are partly to replace Russian barrels, two of the sources said. India, the world's third-largest oil importer, is the biggest buyer of seaborne Russian crude.
Indian state refiners - IOC, Hindustan Petroleum Corp., Bharat Petroleum Corp., and Mangalore Refinery Petrochemical Ltd. had not sought Russian crude in the past week or so, it was reported last week (learn more).
In IOC's tender that closed on Friday, P66 and Equinor will each ship 1 MMbbl of U.S. West Texas Intermediate Midland crude while Mercuria will ship 2 MMbbl of the same grade, the sources said. Vitol will deliver 1 MMbbl of WTI Midland and WCS, they added. Trafigura will deliver 2 MMbbl of Das.
Prices for the deals were not immediately available.
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