Saudi Arabia was once again the top supplier to China, the world’s number one crude importer, in July. Though the 1.647mn b/d that China took from Saudi Arabia was down on June’s record 1.88mn b/d (MEES, 2 August), Saudi Arabia extended its lead over number two importer Russia from where China took 1.341mn b/d.

Saudi Arabia has now been top for five of the first seven months of 2018. This comes after Russia was ahead for 23 straight months to January, and some 300,000 b/d ahead of Saudi Arabia for 2018 as a whole. (CONTINUED - 1132 WORDS)