Record Russian Oil Purchase Move from China and India

After Russia's war on Ukraine, many countries took sanctions against Russia, while India and China, the two largest buyers in Asia, imported oil from Russia in record volumes.

Asian giants China and India imported record amounts of Russian oil, when other countries came to the point of halting Russian oil imports and took sanctions with Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The total volume of crude stored at sea from the OPEC+ producer last week was 74 to 49 million barrels, according to market intelligence firm Kpler. Before the occupation of Ukraine in February, this rate was around 27 million barrels. While Asia overtook Europe for the first time last month as the largest buyer, this gap between the two regions is expected to widen further in May. While America, Britain and many European companies stopped their post-war oil purchases in Ukraine, this situation led the Moscow government to Asian buyers. Jane Xie, senior oil analyst at Kpler in Singapore, said: "Some buyers in Asia are motivated more by economic developments than by political stance. The US has expressed a negative view of India's increased oil purchases from Russia, which may cause a downward flow on the current trade."