Saudi Aramco Retakes China's Biggest Supplier

Saudi Aramco, the world's largest oil company by output, will retake the top spot as China's largest crude supplier, Ibrahim Mishari, the company's vice president for marketing and supply said in Singapore today.

State-owned Saudi Aramco, which markets the kingdom's oil, fell behind Angola as China's biggest supplier this year. Saudi Arabia's closer to China than Angola and the shorter distance in shipping will help the company to boost sales to the region, Mishari said.

Delays in refinery upgrades in China have forced refiners to seek more crude from Angola, which pumps better-quality crude than most Middle East producers, Mishari said.

China's imports from Africa, Kazakhstan, Russia and Venezuela this year have lowered the market share of Persian Gulf producers such as Saudi Arabia, Oman and Yemen in the world's second-largest energy market.

Shipments from the Persian Gulf to China rose 5.8 percent to 33.1 million metric tons in the first half of this year. In the same period, imports from Africa rose 22 percent to 23.4 million tons, according to customs data. Angola, sub-Saharan Africa's second-largest oil producer, shipped 15 million tons of crude oil to China in the first seven months of the year, 13 percent more than Saudi Arabia.