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China's crude oil imports could slow but will remain at healthy levels on rising consumption and booming construction, an official at state-owned oil major Sinopec Group said on Tuesday.
Concern has arisen in recent months among some investors that demand from the world's No.2 crude importer may weaken as the economy is expected to lose steam amid government measures to rein in blind expansion in sectors including property and manufacturing.
Crude imports declined 3.2 percent in July from a year earlier, the first fall in 16 months, as refiners drew on hefty inventories after earlier record purchases. In the first half, crude shipments to China jumped 30 percent. [ID:nTOE67901Z]
"Growth rates could slow a little, but there are new buildings, new roads and reconstruction everywhere. At the end of the year, the economy will be good and consumption will be good," the president of Sinopec's Economics and Development Research Institute, Li Xihong, told Reuters on the sidelines of a forum of Asian state oil companies in Seoul.
Li declined to comment on a media report that CNOOC Ltd (0883.HK: Quote)(CEO.N: Quote) and Sinopec had held talks with oil and gas start-up OGX Petroleo e Gas Participacoes SA (OGXP3.SA: Quote) to buy some of the Brazilian company's oil assets, in their latest effort to expand in the South American nation. [ID:nTOE67I028]
He also declined to comment on whether Sinopec would be interested in BP Plc's (BP.L: Quote) stake in the Nam Con Son gas project in Vietnam. (Reporting by Miyoung Kim; Editing by Chris Lewis)
China's crude oil imports could slow but will remain at healthy levels on rising consumption and booming construction, an official at state-owned oil major Sinopec Group said on Tuesday.
Concern has arisen in recent months among some investors that demand from the world's No.2 crude importer may weaken as the economy is expected to lose steam amid government measures to rein in blind expansion in sectors including property and manufacturing.
Crude imports declined 3.2 percent in July from a year earlier, the first fall in 16 months, as refiners drew on hefty inventories after earlier record purchases. In the first half, crude shipments to China jumped 30 percent. [ID:nTOE67901Z]
"Growth rates could slow a little, but there are new buildings, new roads and reconstruction everywhere. At the end of the year, the economy will be good and consumption will be good," the president of Sinopec's Economics and Development Research Institute, Li Xihong, told Reuters on the sidelines of a forum of Asian state oil companies in Seoul.
Li declined to comment on a media report that CNOOC Ltd (0883.HK: Quote)(CEO.N: Quote) and Sinopec had held talks with oil and gas start-up OGX Petroleo e Gas Participacoes SA (OGXP3.SA: Quote) to buy some of the Brazilian company's oil assets, in their latest effort to expand in the South American nation. [ID:nTOE67I028]
He also declined to comment on whether Sinopec would be interested in BP Plc's (BP.L: Quote) stake in the Nam Con Son gas project in Vietnam. (Reporting by Miyoung Kim; Editing by Chris Lewis)