Indian refiners purchase more US crude ahead of proposed trade talks in May

By Yongchang Chin and Bill Lehane

 

Indian refiners have been boosting US oil purchases before trade talks between the two nations next month.

 

Around 11.2 million barrels of crude are set to arrive in India from the US in June, the highest volume since last August, according to provisional data from analytics firm Kpler Ltd. That comes after a drop in prices in the West Texas Intermediate benchmark as the result of lower demand because of a refinery overhaul in Singapore, along with reduced appetite in China — the world’s biggest oil importer. 

 

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“WTI has to discount significantly more than usual to incentivise the rest of Asia to take in the barrels,” said June Goh, a senior oil market analyst at Sparta Commodities. “There is also a geopolitical element, where Asian buyers may seek more WTI as a negotiating tool with the US to reduce the reciprocal tariffs, per what we are observing with Indonesia and India.”

 

India’s trade deficit widened more than expected in March, as oil imports jumped more than 60 per cent from a month earlier. The nation’s exporters have been urging New Delhi officials to seal a bilateral trade deal with the US as soon as possible, with in-person negotiations set to start in the second half of May, after President Donald Trump paused a proposed 26 per cent tariff on the Asian nation this month. 

 

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State refiners including Indian Oil Corp. and Bharat Petroleum Corp. have purchased at least 6 million barrels of June-arrival crude from the US across various tenders held this month, according to Bloomberg calculations. 

 

Bharat Petroleum — which is also seeking spot supplies including grades from the US — bought 1 million barrels for the four months through September. Indian Oil has also started buying crude for July, including 3 million barrels from the US.

 

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Indian Oil and Bharat Petroleum didn’t respond to requests for comments due to the release of their earnings this week. 

 

Private refiner Reliance Industries Ltd. is also a regular buyer of US crude, although it isn’t yet clear how much they have procured for the coming months.

 

The stronger American sales to India are displacing purchases from West Africa, which is typically one of India’s main sources of lighter oil imports, according to traders.