Saudi Arabia remained the top destination for seaborne fuel oil and vacuum gasoil (VGO) cargoes from Russian ports in July amid strong summer demand for air-conditioning, though shipments were down 18 per cent from June at 1.1 million tonnes, data from traders and LSEG showed.
Saudi Arabia has ramped up purchases of discounted Russian fuel oil for its power sector instead of valuable crude oil that would otherwise be burned for electricity.
Since the European Union's full embargo on Russian oil products took effect in February 2023, the Middle East and Asia have become the main outlets for Russia's fuel oil and VGO.
Meanwhile, Russian fuel exports to Singapore and Malaysia, major bunkering and storage hubs, rose 2.5 times month-on-month in July to around 0.47 million tonnes, LSEG data showed.
There were no shipments of fuel oil or VGO from Russian ports to India last month after 150,000 tonnes in June, though tankers with around 230,000 tonnes of dark oil products on board are positioned near the Suez Canal and their final destination is still unclear.
In 2025, India was one of the main importers of Russian fuel oil and VGO for its refineries as cheaper alternative to Urals crude oil, but sanctions imposed last year by the US Treasury Department on Russia's major oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil, forced buyers to step back from fuel purchases.
Exports of dark oil products from Russian ports to Turkey dropped 21 per cent in July from a month earlier to 150,000 tonnes.
In total, Russian seaborne fuel oil and VGO export shipments dropped 12 per cent month-on-month in July to 2.4 million tonnes, as Ukrainian drone attacks led to refinery outages and lower oil products output.
All shipping data cited is based on cargo departure dates.
(Reporting by Reuters Editing by Sonia Cheema)
