Indian refiners reap Russian discount rewards

India continues to take significant volumes of discounted Russian crude

India’s crude imports have shifted significantly since the onset of the Russia-Ukraine war in late February. Between March and July this year, Russia replaced Saudi Arabia as India’s second-largest source of crude oil, behind Iraq in first place, thanks to the significant discounts offered by Russian exporters. India imported a total of 80.6mn t of crude oil between April and July, up 21.4pc year-on-year. And the portion of supply from Eurasia—which includes Russia and Azerbaijan, with the later only accounting for a small fraction—accounted for a record 18.8pc of imports during the April-June period this year, compared with just 3.4pc a year earlier, according to petroleum ministry data. Go