IOC, BPCL buy sanctions-free Russian oil for January amid wider discounts

State refiners Indian Oil Corp and Bharat Petroleum Corp have placed January orders for the loading of Russian oil from non-sanctioned suppliers due to widening discounts, trade sources with knowledge of the matter said.

BPCL has bought four cargoes, two each of Russian Urals and CPC, they said, adding that Urals have been sold at a discount of $6-$7 per barrel to the dated Brent.

India's top refiner, IOC, has also bought some cargoes of Russian oil for January loading, they said.

IOC has been consistently buying sanctions-compliant Russian oil cargoes after Washington imposed sanctions on top Russian oil producers Rosneft and Lukoil in October. However, BPCL skipped the purchases of December-loading of Russian oil.

The majority of the oil supplied through the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) system is from Kazakhstan. Russia also sells some oil through CPC.

BPCL has no plans to buy more January-loading Russian cargoes as the refiner has made purchases from other suppliers to meet its requirements, one of the sources said.

BPCL and IOC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Other state refiners, Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd, Hindustan Petroleum Corp and private company HPCL-Mittal Energy Ltd, have stopped buying Russian oil.

Nayara Energy, partly owned by Rosneft, is exclusively processing Russian oil after other suppliers pulled back following British and EU sanctions.

Reliance Industries Ltd, operator of the world's biggest refining complex, has said it will process any parcel arriving after November 20 under its deal with Rosneft at its Indian market-focussed refinery.

(Reporting by Nidhi Verma; Editing by Tom Hogue, Michael Perry and Thomas Derpinghaus)