However, it did not give any numbers or place a ceiling on purchases of Iranian crude.
At a news conference in Hong Kong, Sinopec Chairman Fu Chengyu was asked how much Iranian oil China would buy over the rest of this year.
He said, “It depends on market prices and the needs of our refining business…. A slowdown in China’s economy and oil demand in the first half has affected our refining throughput.”
That was a very vague statement that fell far short of supporting his earlier statement that Sinopec would abide by the new US standards that require countries to make a “significant reduction” in their purchases of Iranian crude to avoid US sanctions.
Fu said Sinopec had won a bid to build a $1 billion clean-energy project in Texas. It is thus likely that the firm would not wish to run afoul on any US regulations that might endanger that contract.