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India Diversifies Oil Sources: More Imports from US, Abu Dhabi, and West Africa
Crude Oil: After US sanctions on Russia, India's state-owned refineries have now started purchasing crude oil from the US and Abu Dhabi. Indian Oil and MRPL have signed new contracts.
The country's state-owned refineries are now paying more to buy crude oil from the US and Abu Dhabi instead of Russia. Indian Oil is looking for more oil from the US. MRPL has also bought crude from Abu Dhabi. Industry sources said that last week's imposition of sanctions by the US on two top Russian producers has prompted many domestic companies to stop placing new orders for Russian oil.
Sources added that state-owned domestic companies were now seeking alternatives to Russia in the spot market. MRPL had bought 2 million barrels of Abu Dhabi Murban crude from Glencore through a tender in December to compensate for Russian supplies. The refiners would use spot markets each month and seek additional supplies from their regular suppliers. Companies are not importing oil from Russia, fearing the risk of sanctions.
Hindustan Petroleum Corporation-Mittal Energy said it has also stopped purchasing Russian oil. Indian Oil Corporation has invited preliminary bids for 24 million barrels of oil from the United States for the first quarter of 2026. The tender seeks cargoes of both low-sulfur and high-sulfur crude oil. Indian Oil is assessing the market and selecting sellers in a position to purchase oil from the United States. The tender will close on Friday.
Indian Oil purchased two million barrels of West African crude oil from ExxonMobil through a tender on Wednesday. This purchase was for Mondo from Angola and Utapet from Nigeria for December delivery. Additional offers were received in the tender, but due to high prices, only two million barrels were obtained. Traders are also monitoring future demand from Reliance Industries, India's largest buyer of Russian oil.
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Earlier, US President Donald Trump once again claimed that India has significantly reduced its oil purchases from Russia. He said that India is doing very well on this front. Trump made this comment during a media interaction after meeting Chinese President Xi Jinping during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit. Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One, "We can't do much about China's oil purchases. They've been buying oil from Russia for a long time. It meets their major energy needs, but I can say that India is doing very well on this front. We didn't discuss oil in detail, but rather whether we could do something together to end the war."
