Saudi Arabia has traditionally accounted for most of the crude imports by Asia, the world's biggest oil-consuming region. But recently OPEC's top producer has lost ground in a number of major markets including Russia and China, and faces a further threat from Iran, which is ramping up exports after the removal of Western sanctions.

Amid all the gloom inflicted by adverse market conditions, intense focus on efficiency improvement emerges as a bright underlying theme. With oil prices now $50./b after hitting a low of $27 a barrel in January, the expectation is that some stability may finally be returning to the market. Higher oil price is certainly a positive for producers.

This summer the U.S. oil price has whipsawed from more than $50 a barrel in June to below $40 earlier this month. In the past two weeks it has risen more than 20%, to a recent $48.22 a barrel.

Customs data showed on Monday that diesel exports rose 181.8 percent to a record 1.53 million tonnes, almost tripling China's average monthly export volume in 2015.

During the period we continued to focus on improving our efficiency and pro-actively restructured some of our central functions and have reduced costs in those areas where business activity reduced. As a result margins were higher than both Q1, 2016 and Q2, 2015.

The slumping oil price has carved a chunk out of Australian oil and gas majors, with Woodside Petroleum reporting that profits halved in the first six months of the year while Santos swung to a loss of more than $1bn.

“This period of low oil price is not a time to jeopardize Nigeria’s long term interests by showing Nigeria as a place not to be trusted, and projecting our business environment as unconducive,”

The Russian government has issued the license for the Central Oil and Gas Company – a joint venture between Lukoil (25%), Gazprom (25%) and Kazakhstan’s KazMunaiGaz (50% ) – to develop the Central field.

Indonesia's Pertamina has signed a deal with Petrochemical Commercial Company (PCC) of Iran for the import of refined petroleum and petrochemical products.

“In this underground lies the energy that China needs for the future. Currently, we are sending 600 Mbpd of crude to China, and we expect to increase this trade to more than 1 MMbpd within the next years.”

India will save about Rs 20,000 crore ($3bn) as it has renegotiated a long-term LNG import deal with Qatar, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Monday.

Net income attributable to the shareholders of Petrobras of US$ 106 million, compared to net loss attributable to the shareholders of Petrobras of US$ 318 million in the 1Q-2016, as a result of: - A decrease of 22% in net finance expenses; - An 7% increase of crude oil and natural gas total production; - Higher revenues with an increase of 14% in crude oil and oil products exports and lower costs related to natural gas imports; Expenses related to the new Voluntary Separation Incentive Plan (PIDV); and Impairment losses related to Comperj assets.

Net income growth by x6.4 times to RUB 89 bln in 2Q 2016 Increase in EBITDA by 27.5%, to RUB 348 bln; EBITDA margin above 27% Effective control of operating and SG&A costs Industry leadership in free cash flow generation Decrease in net debt by 41.4%, to USD 23.4 bln from 1H 2015

Eni owns the whole of Zohr and has said it is interested in bringing in partners as part of its strategy of selling some of its prize acreage to help meet a target of raising 5 billion euros from asset disposal over the next two years.

As a result of the investment, Iraq's crude output should increase by 250,000-350,000 barrels per day next year, the Iraqi officials said. The country now produces about 4.6 million bpd, most of it from the southern region.