(MENAFN- Arab Times) Saudi Arabia has cut the official selling price (OSP) for its benchmark Arab Light crude to Asia in August, as expected, while raising the price to European customers. State oil company Aramco has lowered the August price for its Arab Light grade for Asian customers by 10 cents a barrel versus July, setting it at minus $0.10 to the Oman/Dubai average, it said on Sunday.
The top oil exporter raised its August OSP for its Arab Light grade to northwest Europe by 25 cents a barrel from the previous month at a discount of $2.65 a barrel to the Brent Weighted Average (BWAVE).
The Arab Light OSP to the United States was unchanged for August from a month earlier, set at a premium of $1.55 a barrel to the Argus Sour Crude Index (ASCI).
A Reuters survey on Wednesday forecast a cut for medium and heavy grades Aramco sells to Asia in August on weaker fuel oil cracks, while keeping price for its flagship light crude little changed.
The price cuts reflects lower crude demand in Asia as refining margins weakened. OPEC's supply, at the highest for three years in June, also weighed on the market.
OPEC supply rose in June to 31.60 million barrels per day (bpd) from a revised 31.30 million bpd in May because of record, or near-record, output from Iraq and Saudi Arabia, a Reuters survey found.
Saudi Arabia and other members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) left their group production target unchanged last month. The producing group chose to focus on building market share rather than defending world oil prices, which are down around 45 percent from the middle of last year.
Saudi crude OSPs set the trend for Iranian, Kuwaiti and Iraqi prices, affecting more than 12 million bpd of crude bound for Asia.
Saudi Aramco sets its crude prices based on recommendations from customers and after calculating the change in the value of its oil over the past month, based on yields and product prices.
Saudi Arabian Oil Co., the worldÃs largest oil exporter, is planning to spend between $70 billion and $80 billion on overseas acquisitions and investments during the next five years, three people with knowledge of the matter said.
The investment is part of the state-owned companyÃs target of spending $150 billion at home and internationally through 2019, the people said, asking not to be identified as the information is private. Saudi Aramco, as the company is known, will focus on Asia, particularly China and Korea, they said.
Saudi Aramco is expanding in refining and petrochemicals and seeking to boost ties with Asia as part of its ambition to become both the worldÃs largest oil and chemicals producer by the end of the decade. Last year, it bought a $2 billion stake in S-Oil Corp., South KoreaÃs third-largest oil refiner.
The company has joint-venture plants in China, owns stakes in refining businesses in South Korea, Japan and the U.S. and markets its crude and refined products globally.
Aramco secured a $10 billion loan in March that could be used to fund potential acquisitions, people with knowledge of the matter told Bloomberg at the time. The company didnÃt respond to requests for comment.
The Saudi state-owned oil company reduced its borrowing costs when it used the new $10 billion facility to replace a $4 billion facility, the company said in a later statement confirming the deal. That was despite the drop in oil prices.
Falling energy prices and low borrowing costs have sparked a wave of consolidation in the oil and gas sector. Mergers and acquisitions activity in the energy industry rose 58 percent to $355 billion in 2014, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
The fall in oil prices has made some upstream assets more attractive to buy, Saif Al Falasi, chief executive officer at Emirates National Oil Co., said in April. The company is bidding to buy the 46 percent of London-traded producer Dragon Oil that it doesnÃt already own, the company said in March.
Kuwait Foreign Petroleum Exploration Co., known as Kufpec, may increase the size of a $1 billion loan to $2.5 billion, three people with knowledge of the matter said in March.
The tables below show the full FOB prices for August in U.S. dollars.
Saudi term crude supplies to the United States are priced as a differential to the Argus Sour Crude Index (ASCI).
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