> Saudi Arabia’s refineries processed an all-time record 2.22mn b/d of crude in December as the 400,000 b/d Yasref Refinery in Yanbu’, which started trial runs in September, continued to ramp up towards full capacity. The Yasref start-up takes overall Saudi CDU capacity to a record 2.9mn b/d. But with December’s throughputs only 76% of this, more records can be expected in the coming months.

> Saudi Arabian crude output edged up to 9.71mn b/d in 2014, the second highest (after 2012) since production briefly topped 10mn b/d in the early 1980s. But, with record volumes of this crude (23% of output for December) being refined domestically, crude exports have fallen – down 440,000 b/d to 7.1mn for 2014. (CONTINUED - 347 WORDS)