Saudi Aramco’s trading arm, Aramco Trading (ATC) is rapidly stepping up its activities. Overall liquids traded in 2017 totaled just 1.40mn b/d, jumped to 2.17mn b/d in 2018 and 4.5mn b/d in 1Q 2019. The firm aims to reach 6mn b/d by the end of this year (MEES, 19 July 2019).
It appears to have achieved another boost towards reaching this aim, with Reuters this week reporting that it has signed a deal with state-owned Kuwait Petroleum Corp (KPC) to supply Kuwaiti crude to Aramco’s overseas refineries. There was no further detail on volumes. ATC’s stated purpose is “to integrate Saudi Aramco’s global downstream assets to maximize profitability, while ensuring that Saudi Aramco’s system is optimized and reliably balanced.” (CONTINUED - 123 WORDS)