09:37:19 December 12, 2008 China Petrochemical News Net
Shengyi Agency December 12 China’s crude oil imports hit its annual low in November, which further signifies the sharp decrease of petroleum demands due to the continuous slowdown of China’s economy. Some analysts predict that oil prices may fall below USD 50 this year and next year.
According to the statistics released by the Customs Wednesday (10th), China imported 13.36 million tons of crude oils in November or an equivalent of 3.26 million barrels every day. Despite such substantial decrease of crude oil price last month, China’s imports of crude oils drop by 17.3% compared with October and by 1.8% compared with the 13.61 million tons of the same period last year. Mr. Paul Ting, an analyst who has been tracking the development trend of petroleum in China, states in a recent report that the US petroleum consumption is decreasing sharply at a rate never seen since the 1980s while the shrinkage of China's petroleum demands is dropping even more quickly.
The signs of China’s languishing petroleum demands are verified. Despite the sharp decrease of international oil prices since July, the Chinese government has not yet adjusted the prices of product oils domestically, which brings abnormally high profits for Chinese refineries even if they have reduced their outputs. Analysts say that China may supplement its strategic petroleum reserve capitalizing on the slump of oil prices, which may boost China’s crude oil imports. However, such supplementary demand won’t be enough to offset the decrease in domestic demands.
According to the statistics of CBIChina, main refineries of Sinopec may reduce their output by 6% to 12.7 million tons or a daily equivalent of 3 million barrels in December compared with that of last month. As one Petrochina management personnel puts it, Petrochina is planning to reduce outputs although at a rate not as high as Sinopec. China is also reducing the quantity of product oils imported from overseas and the imports of product oils have hit the lowest in two years.
