China oil stockpiling helps offset global surplus, S&P Global says

China, the world's biggest oil importer, has been stockpiling crude at a multi-year high pace, helping to offset a global surplus amid output hikes by OPEC+ producers, S&P Global told the APPEC conference on Monday.

China has been building up crude oil inventories at a rate of 530,000 barrels per day (bpd) so far this year, said Jim Burkhard, global head of crude oil market research at S&P Global Commodity Insights.

Its pace of stockpiling marks one of the biggest increases in a year seen outside of 2020, and has played a major role in helping to soak up surplus production, particularly in the second quarter, Burkhard said.

China's total onshore crude oil inventories are at around 1.4 billion barrels, he said.

"That is a very, very large increase, bigger than global oil demand growth," he said.

S&P pegged global oil demand growth at 700,000 bpd for this year, with over half of that for natural gas liquids and biofuels and the remaining 350,000 bpd growth for crude oil.