IOC skips US crude, buys Nigerian, Mideast oil, say sources

New Delhi: Top Indian refiner Indian Oil Corp (IOC) skipped the purchase of US oil in its latest tender and instead bought 2 million barrels of West African and a million barrels of Middle Eastern grade, trade sources said on Friday.

The state refiner also bought one million barrels each of Nigerian oil grades Agbami and Usan from French oil major TotalEnergy, and another million barrels of Abu Dhabi’s

Das crude from Shell, the sources said.

Nigerian oil has been bought on free-on-board basis and Das has been purchsed on a delivered basis for arrival at Indian ports in late October-early November, Reuters reported.

In its previous tender last week, IOC bought 5 million barrels of US West Texas Intermediate.

In recent months, Indian refiners have advantage of a favourable arbitrage window and raised their purchase of US oil via tender.

Their US oil purchases were also helping cut India’s massive trade surplus with the US, which has doubled the tariff on Indian imports to 50 per cent, citing New Delhi’s purchase of Russian oil.

The landed cost for US crude was high compared to other grades, despite the front-month Brent-WTI differential being about $4 per barrel.