Russia will continue to sell as much oil as possible to India despite a recovery in Chinese demand. Moscow wishes to maintain and increase its share in Indian imports, favoring China. Such a conclusion based on statistical data is made by the Kpler company, which specializes in raw materials.
A year ago, India bought almost no Russian oil, but became an important market after the United States and the European Union imposed sanctions on domestic crude. The Asian country imported about 1.85 million bpd from Russia in February, close to its potential export peak of 2.5 million bpd. Victor Katona, a leading oil analyst at Kpler, told Bloomberg about it.
While Beijing can ‘literally buy all of Russia’s oil exports’ by abandoning the Covid-0 policy, Russia is artificially regulating supplies in hopes of preserving the Indian market because it is more promising in many ways, not just economically, and gives sellers of more controlled raw materials, despite the fact that sales to India are more expensive, since the Russian Federation itself pays for delivery (condition of shipment to local ports).
This significant gap in the trade relationship between the two countries (unlike China) is compensated by two circumstances. Russia’s largest mining company, Rosneft, has a 49.13% stake in Nayara Energy Ltd., which in turn owns the Vadinar refinery, India’s second-largest refinery, and associated port infrastructure. In addition, the trip to India, provided that the tanker is sent from the western ports of the Russian Federation, takes less time than to China: 30 days instead of 35.
In other words, the agency’s analysts again saw a political subtext in Russian energy exports, even under the embargo and the price cap, when there is not much choice among customers. Moscow continues to try to maneuver oil and gas, trying to fix the partnership with cheap raw materials where it is fragile (India), leaving everything unchanged the other way, where all is well (China).
Such “juggling” and the demonstration of a well-thought-out foreign energy policy became particularly visible in February, when the PRC actually received fewer shipments so that Moscow could appease “doubtful” India.
