China and Japan cut oil imports

Baku. 20 July. REPORT.AZ/ Oil traders may soon be prepared to find new sales areas that will replace Asian markets.

Report informs citing the Bloomberg, declining demand for gasoline in two major Asian economies - China and Japan have sharply narrowed oil imports. According to forecasts, the world's largest oil producer, China Petroleum&Chemical Corp State company will reduce daily oil production by 10% or 240,000 barrels during June-August period.

In April, demand for oil in China decreased by 0.3% and gasoline consumption fell by 6.3%. According to Shanghai Securities News Information agency, Sinopec petrol stations in China have already started a 2.3-yuan discount on gasoline.

Notably, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), in 2017, the demand for gasoline in China was 95,000 bpd. This, in turn, is lower than average indicator of the last two years (230-290 thousand bpd).

The IEA linked the decline in petrol demand in China with the preference of the population for cycling and electromobiles.

So, in 2016, 352,000 electric cars were registered in China.This is by 200,000 more than the similar indicator of US. Since 2014, this indicator has grown by 381% in China this year.

Notably, according to the Japanese Finance Ministry, in June, Japan's total crude oil imports fell by 12.5% year-on-year up to $ 95 mln barrels.