Reuters called China's drop in oil demand a shock to oil producers

China, the world's largest buyer of crude oil, will cease to be the engine of growth in demand for transportation fuel due to the rapid transition of the country's population to electric cars. This was reported by Reuters on December 3, citing analysts.

Experts estimated that, presumably, oil imports in the PRC will reach a maximum as early as next year, and after that the country's demand will begin to decline, which will "put an end to the long-standing period when the state was the main driver of demand growth for oil consumption."

"The speed of the shift to electric mobility has stunned oil producers and investors. No market can replace Chinese demand, which has accounted for 41% of the annual growth in global oil consumption," the article elaborated.

Earlier, on November 20, Sergey Tereshkin, General Director of OPEN OIL MARKET, a marketplace for oil products and raw materials, noted in a conversation with Izvestia that electrification and gasification of transportation will restrain oil demand in China. The former will become a determining factor in the long term, he added. The expert also drew attention to the fact that the pace of transition to electric transportation in China may be even more rapid, given the fact that China is a world leader in the development of battery technology.

Prior to that, on November 7, the General Administration of Customs of China reported that for the period from January to October, the volume of trade turnover between Russia and China increased by 2.8% compared to the data for the same period in 2023. It was specified that oil, gas and natural coal made up the bulk of exports from Russia.

Tereshkin back on October 2 expressed the assumption that the average price of Brent oil in 2025 will fall below $70 per barrel. According to him, the market will be increasingly affected by long-term factors, including stabilization of global demand. In addition, the expert noted that stabilization of demand for oil "will be facilitated by the electric car revolution, the flagship of which is China," where this summer sales of electric cars, plug-in hybrids and fuel cell cars for the first time exceeded sales of internal combustion engine (ICE) cars. According to Kept, Tereshkin continued, five of the world's ten largest electric vehicle manufacturers are Chinese companies, including BYD, Geely Auto and Changan.