Twenty of the rating participants account for almost 85% of Russian oil exports, and in 2016 it reached 254.8 million tons. In the first place is Litasco, the Swiss trader of Lukoil.
While oil-dependent states patch budget holes, and mining companies become weaned from super-profits and turn off investments, the trading business feels fine. Oil traders do not carry mining risks, one of the traders told Forbes. The profit is created due to a combination of tools: physical purchase and sale of volumes, futures, options and swaps. “Having a physical volume behind the back, traders can earn ten times on it, so they are ready to pay premiums to those who guarantee the physical volume,” the Forbes interlocutor admitted.
It is the earnings on contango (a term of the futures market, the surcharge in the price charged by the seller for deferring settlement of the transaction) that allow the oil producing giants having their own trading divisions (BP, Shell and others) to show excellent financial results against a background of falling prices. They inexpensively stockpile millions of barrels of oil and sell futures contracts for the same volumes more expensively.
Rosneft has several own trading companies, and they are in the rating of the largest buyers of Russian oil under the Forbes version. And at the end of 2016, Glencore became one of the shareholders of Rosneft and received additional volumes of its oil together with the block of shares. So in the coming years, the relationship between Rosneft and traders will be very strong.
For the second year the trading company of Lukoil, Litasco has been the largest buyer of Russian oil (32.9 million tons). It now manages to buy comparable volumes of oil from third-party manufacturers.
Among the buyers of Russian oil Forbes has also named the following companies: China National United Oil Corporation (27.6 million tons), Trafigura (23.1 million tons), Totsa (20.3 million tons), Glencore (14.8 million tons), Orlen (12.5 million tons), Vitol (11.2 million tons), Tatneft (10.3 million tons), and Shell Trading (9.0 million tons). The trader of BP (2.6 million tons) is the 19th on the list.
| N | Company | AMOUNT OF CONTRACTS $ bn | VOLUME OF PURCHASE MILLION T | PRICE OF ONE BARREL $ |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |
 |
9.3 | 32.9 | 38 |
| 2 |
 |
8.3 | 27.6 | 40.6 |
| 3 |
 |
6.8 | 23.1 | 39.7 |
| 4 |
 |
5.7 | 20.3 | 37.9 |
| 5 |
 |
4.1 | 14.8 | 37.4 |
| 6 |
 |
3.5 | 12.5 | 38.2 |
| 7 |
 |
3.2 | 11.2 | 38.6 |
| 8 |
 |
2.9 | 10.3 | 37.6 |
| 9 |
 |
2.6 | 9 | 39.5 |
| 10 |
 |
2 | 6.6 | 40.6 |
| 11 |
 |
1.9 | 6.2 | 41.9 |
| 12 |
 |
1.9 | 5.5 | 45.8 |
| 13 |
 |
1.7 | 5.8 | 38.8 |
| 14 |
 |
1.6 | 7.6 | 28.8 |
| 15 |
 |
1.3 | 4.3 | 39.3 |
| 16 |
 |
1.2 | 5.8 | 28.2 |
| 17 |
 |
1 | 3.4 | 41.9 |
| 18 |
 |
0.9 | 2.8 | 44.7 |
| 19 |
 |
0.8 | 2.6 | 43.4 |
| 20 |
 |
