China's crude imports from its major suppliers, including Iran, rose significantly in October versus a year ago, save for top exporters Saudi Arabia and Angola, detailed data from the General Administration of Customs showed Saturday, November 22.
Crude imports from Iran last month surged 35.5% from a year earlier to 1.44 million mt, or an average 340,027 b/d. Iran, however, remained China's sixth-largest supplier of crude oil last month, accounting for 6% of its total imports.
China imported less crude from Saudi Arabia and Angola in October despite its total crude imports rising 18% from a year earlier to 5.7 million b/d.
Saudi volumes inched down 0.7% year on year to 4.56 million mt while Angolan cargoes fell 5.6% to 3.04 million mt last month.
On the other hand, China's crude imports from Iraq in October jumped 45.1% year on year to 1.96 million mt, although the volumes slumped 20.5% from September.
Omani shipments to China in October rose 7.6% to 2.38 million mt while cargoes from the United Arab Emirates climbed 42.2% to 1 million mt.
Meanwhile, Russian crude deliveries to China jumped 38.7% year on year to 2.76 million mt last month, pushing Russia to third largest supplier.
Chinese refiners buy significant volumes of ESPO crude, which is sent via pipeline from Russia and also loads out of the port of Kozmino.
At least five Aframax tankers with average capacity of 110,000 mt arrived in China last month from Kozmino.
The buyers included state-owned ChemChina and Unipec, trading arm of state-owned Sinopec or China Petroleum and Chemical Corp.
In addition, one vessel arrived in China's northeastern Tianjin port from Novorossiysk, where Urals crude is loaded, and another Aframax from the Prigorodnoye export terminal on Sakhalin island arrived in Quanzhou in China's Fujian province in mid-October, according to Platts cFlow ship-tracking software. Russia's light, sweet Vityaz grade is loaded out of Prigorodnoye.
For the first time, imports from Panama showed up in the Chinese customs data, with inflows of 200,807 mt last month.
The VLCC Andromeda arrived in Tianjin in mid-October after sailing from the Panama port of Puerto Armuelles on August 26, according to cFlow.
It is not known who chartered the vessel.
YEAR-TO-DATE IMPORTS FROM SAUDI ARABIA, ANGOLA FALL
Over January to October, China's total imports of crude oil rose 9.2% to 6.09 million b/d. This is the fastest pace of growth since 2010.
Yet imports of Saudi crude slumped 9.6% to 41.14 million mt while Angolan deliveries slipped 1.5% to 33.34 million mt over the period.
Chinese refiners say they have taken less Saudi crude than expected this year because of more competitive crudes from other countries, while Angola's state-owned Sonangol previously said it has seen appetite from China wane because of slowing economic growth.
On the other hand, Russian crude exports to China increased 27.6% to 26.07 million mt over January to October and Oman was in fourth place with 24.46 million mt, a 20.6% year-on-year increase.
China's imports from Iraq rose 24.3% over the same period to 23.5 million mt while Iranian shipments rose 33.4% to 22.77 million mt.
So far this year, the Middle East has accounted for 52.2% of China's crude imports, up from 51.5% over January to October last year, while the share of African crudes has fallen from 23.2% to 22% over the same period.
Latin America accounted for 10.9% of China's total crude imports this year, rising from 9.4% previously.
