Vitol is separately shipping a cargo of Venezuelan oil to its Saras refinery in Italy as part of the deal, several industry sources told Reuters earlier on Thursday. Vitol declined to comment.
The vessel Poliegos is set to start loading crude oil from Venezuela’s Jose terminal around January 29, data from ship tracking service Kpler showed. The vessel will be loaded by Vitol, a source familiar with the matter said.
Vitol has also struck deals to sell cargoes of Venezuelan oil to US refiners Valero Energy and Phillips 66, Reuters reported on Wednesday.
The trading houses have been marketing Venezuelan oil to refiners in India and elsewhere too.
(Reporting by Pietro Lombardi, Shariq Khan, Ahmad Ghaddar, Arathy Somasekhar and Georgina McCartney; Editing by Alex Lawler, Elaine Hardcastle and Nia Williams)