Saudi Arabia Snaps Up Fuels as Attacks Force Refinery Curbs - Bloomberg:
Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest crude exporter and a powerhouse of the oil refining industry, is scouring global fuel markets for cargoes in the wake of unprecedented attacks on its energy industry.
Aramco Trading Co., which buys and sells fuels on behalf of the state oil company, purchased diesel cargoes and also sought one-off supplies of aviation fuel this week, according to people involved in those markets. Fuel oil, which can be used instead of crude for power generation, has also been bought. Exports of naphtha -- a building-block product for making gasoline and plastics -- have also been disrupted.
While the kingdom does import fuels from time to time anyway, traders say the scale of its current purchasing is well above normal. On Saturday, vital oil-production facilities at Abqaiq were attacked, resulting in a temporary halt to a large swath of the nation’s output capacity. To keep crude flowing to customers, Saudi Arabia cut processing at its own refineries by 1 million barrels a day, and stepped up fuel imports.
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