Russian Oil Concern Rosneft Agrees To Double Oil Shipments To China, Shifting Focus From Struggling Europe

Moscow-based Rosneft NK OAO (MCX:ROSN) is doubling down on China’s hunger for crude.

The company announced Friday it has inked a deal worth hundreds of billions of dollars that will vastly increase Rosneft's “long-term crude oil supply contracts to China” via the China National Petroleum Corporation.

The agreement, which by the second half of this decade will result in a doubling of Rosneft’s crude shipments to China to 600,000 barrels per day and continue at that level for 25 years, was signed Thursday by Russian President Vladimir Putin and Zhang Gaoli, first vice premier of the People's Republic of China, during the Saint Petersburg International Economic Forum.

"The estimated value of the deal is $270 billion," Igor Sechin, board chairman, president and director of the state-owned energy concern, said at a press conference in St. Petersburg Friday, as reported by Reuters.

In recent years, Russia has been shifting its energy exports emphasis to the east while Europe's economy contracts under the stress of its sovereign debt crisis that has lowered manufacturing output and thus demand for oil and gas from the energy rich Russian Federation.

Rosneft is already exporting about 750,00 barrels per day to Asia out of its total daily exports of 4.4 million barrels per day.