India is ramping up purchases and imports of crude oil from the United States ahead of crucial talks on the U.S. tariffs next month.
As many as 11.2 million barrels of U.S. crude are on route to arrive in India in June, per data from analytics firm Kpler cited by Bloomberg. This would be the highest U.S. crude volume arriving in India since August 2024.
India’s state-owned refining giants are leading the higher purchases of U.S. crude, as India hopes to have tariffs lowered if it buys more American energy products.
State Indian refiners, including Indian Oil Corporation and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL), have bought at tenders this month at least 6 million barrels of crude from the U.S. due to arrive in India in June, Bloomberg calculations showed.
“There is also a geopolitical element, where Asian buyers may seek more WTI as a negotiating tool with the US to reduce the reciprocal tariffs, per what we are observing with Indonesia and India,” June Goh, a senior oil market analyst at Sparta Commodities, told Bloomberg.
Most Asian countries are racing to pledge increased imports of U.S. energy to avoid the high tariffs slapped on them in early April. Delegations from many Asian countries are heading to Washington D.C. these days to discuss the U.S. tariffs, which are the highest for economies in Asia and Southeast Asia.
Thailand is looking to import higher volumes of American energy as a way to convince the U.S. Administration not to slap high tariffs on Thai goods sold in the United States.
The tariff on Thailand, which U.S. President Donald Trump announced on the so-called “liberation day” on April 2, was as much as 36%–one of the highest among all economies and jurisdictions.
South Korea is reportedly looking at more LNG imports to get Washington to drop the tariffs.
India is weighing the option to scrap its import tax on American liquefied natural gas to increase U.S. LNG imports and reduce its trade surplus with the United States.
By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com
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