Rosneft asked for roubles and full prepayment in fresh tenders for 6.5 million tonnes of crude oil for the first time in history as Russia’s oil industry follows President Vladimir Putin’s orders to switch to the national currency for gas payments.
Putin ordered a switch to rouble payments for Russian gas delivered by Gazprom at the end of March.
Rosneft offered its Urals, Siberian Light, Sokol and ESPO Blend oil volumes via tenders for loading in May-June and asked tender participants for 100% prepayment converted into roubles, according to two sources citing tender documents.
“Total invoice amount to be converted to Russian roubles by using U.S. dollar/Russian rouble rate of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation” – the tender documents say.
If the buyer is not able to pay in roubles, payment may be done in Chinese yuan, U.S. dollars, euro, United Arab Emirates dirhams and Turkish lira.
Rosneft requires 100% prepayment of the provisional value of the parcel five days prior to the first date of loading range, while in case it’s impossible the company may consider other payment terms, but may refuse any offer that does not offer prepayment, the tender documents said.
Rosneft tenders are rare as formerly most of its crude oil was placed with term buyers, mostly trading firms Vitol and Trafigura.
From May, however, purchases by these firms are expected to fall sharply amid European Union and Swiss sanctions.
Rosneft offered 5.1 million tonnes of Urals oil loading from Primorsk, Ust-Luga and Novorossiisk on May 1-June 30 and 320,000 tonnes of Siberian Light loading on May 1-June 30 from Novorossiisk, the sources said.
Rosneft also offered three Sokol cargoes for loading on May 7-10, 14-17 and May 27-June 1.
According to another source, the company also offered 800,000 tonnes of ESPO Blend loading on May 8-9, 12-13, 16-17, 19-20, 22-23, 26-27, 29-30, 30-31.
The tenders close on April 21 at 1400 Moscow time (1100 GMT).
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Florence Tan and Reuters reporters; editing by Edmund Blair and Jason Neely)