Regional News

LONDON / Reuters Swiss trading giant Glencore and US private equity investor Carlyle Group have teamed up in an attempt to buy Morocco’s only oil refinery, hoping to recoup about $600 million in loans they issued to the plant before it went bankrupt, industry sources said. Two sources close to the process said the Moroccan government wanted at least $2 …

NEW DELHI / Reuters Iraq replaced Saudi Arabia as top crude supplier to India in April as refiners moved to boost their processing margins by purchasing the cheaper Basra Heavy oil grade, ship tracking and Thomson Reuters trade flow data showed. India’s April imports from Iraq topped 1 million barrels per day (bpd) for the first time, up by about …

CAIRO / Reuters Egypt has paid off $750 million of its debt to international oil companies and will make a second payment of the same amount at the start of next month, Central Bank Governor Tarek Amer said. Egypt has struggled to pay arrears to foreign oil and gas companies operating in the country, with outstanding debt at $3.5 billion …

LONDON / Reuters The global oil market is rebalancing and the pace at which supply and demand are falling into line is picking up, even if inventories still fail to reflect the impact of OPEC supply cuts, the International Energy Agency said on Tuesday. In its monthly report, the IEA kept its global demand growth forecast for 2017 unchanged at …

Bloomberg Kuwait joined Saudi Arabia and Russia in supporting an extension of oil-output cuts by OPEC and other global producers through the first quarter of 2018 to help trim global stockpiles. An extension of the cuts at already agreed-upon volumes is needed to reach the goal of paring world inventories to their five-year average, Kuwait’s Oil Minister Issam Almarzooq said …

Bloomberg Saudi Arabia and Russia said they favour prolonging oil-output cuts by global producers through the end of the first quarter of 2018, setting a firmer timeframe for a likely extension of the curbs into next year. Crude prices jumped. Extending the curbs at already agreed-upon volumes is needed to reach the goal of reducing global inventories to the 5-year …

SINGAPORE / Reuters The commercial start-up of Vietnam’s new $7.5 billion Nghi Son oil refinery will be delayed to 2018, from an initial expected start-up in the third quarter of this year, according to a notice on a government website. The 200,000 barrels-per-day (bpd) oil refinery is now planning to start commercial operations in the first quarter of 2018, according …

Bloomberg Red tape, rising costs and declining crude prices are throttling exploration in Indonesia, the former OPEC member that now produces less oil than it uses. Only 20 percent of the 287 onshore rigs operated by contractors for local and foreign explorers are at work, compared with 60 percent in 2012, accor- ding to Wargono Soenarko, chairman of the Indonesian …

Bloomberg India’s oil demand bounced back in April after falling for three consecutive months, recovering from the impact of the country’s move to withdraw high-value notes. Fuel consumption rose 3.3 percent to 16.79 million tons in April, according to the Oil Ministry’s Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell. Diesel use, which accounts for about 40 percent of the total fuel demand …

Bloomberg America’s shale gas could soon head to China under long-term contracts for the first time, bolstered by a new trade deal that may not even change existing rules. Cheniere Energy Inc., the first exporter of natural gas from the lower 48 states, sees the agreement as “amplifying and accelerating conversations about new long-term contracts” with China, said Eben Burnham-Snyder, …