Saudi Arabia To Gain Top Spot In List Of Crude Suppliers To India Post Reliance-Aramco Deal

Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) chairman Mukesh Ambani had earlier announced a 20 per cent stake sale in its Oil to Chemicals business to Saudi Arabia’s Aramco with the business being valued at $75 billion.

The deal also incorporated Saudi Arabia supplying 500,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude being supplied to the business or 25 million tonne a year of crude oil. This increases Saudi Arabia’s share in among crude suppliers to India and will help it regain the top spot in the list, PTI has reported.

Saudi Arabia has traditionally been a regular supplier of the commodity to India but had lost out the top spot to Iraq since the last two financial years. While it had supplied 40.33 million tonnes of crude oil to India, Iraq had came on top with 46.61 million tonnes.

"Crude supplies of 500,000 bpd represents about 40 per cent of Reliance's crude intake, significantly higher than the stake taken, although Saudi Aramco historically supplied 20 per cent of Reliance's crude oil requirements," said Alan Gelder, Vice President, Refining and Chemicals, Wood Mackenzie.

Ambani had declared what will be among the biggest foreign investments in India during RIL’s 42nd Annual General Meeting (AGM) on 12 August.