Crude Oil Buyers — Submit Your Requirement to a Verified Network

Who We Work With on the Buy Side

Crude oil buyers approaching ESA Markets fall into a few broad categories: independent refineries seeking to diversify their crude slate, trading desks building or covering a position, downstream importers in markets without significant domestic production, and intermediary buyers acting on behalf of an end-user refinery. Whatever the structure, the starting point is the same — a clear, specific requirement that our team can test against active seller offers in our network.

We do not maintain an open marketplace where listings are published for anyone to browse. Instead, every buyer requirement is reviewed individually, matched against relevant seller offers, and progressed only where the specification, quantity, and commercial terms appear realistic on both sides.

What to Include in a Buyer Requirement

The single biggest factor in how quickly we can act on a requirement is specificity. A vague inquiry — "looking for crude oil, any grade, any quantity" — is far harder to match than one with clear parameters. When submitting a requirement, buyers should be ready to provide:

• Grade and specification. WTI, Brent, Dubai/Oman, or a named regional grade, along with API gravity and sulphur content if your refinery configuration requires a specific range.
• Quantity and frequency. Whether this is a one-off spot cargo or a recurring monthly/term requirement, and the volume in barrels or metric tons.
• Delivery terms. FOB (Free on Board) or CIF (Cost, Insurance, and Freight), and your preferred or required delivery port.
• Destination. The country and ideally the specific port or refinery where the cargo will be received.
• Payment instrument. Whether you are working with a Letter of Credit, SBLC, or another instrument, and whether your bank can confirm this on request.

The more of this detail you can provide upfront, the faster our team can determine whether a credible match exists in our current network.

How Buyer Inquiries Are Verified

Because a significant share of inquiries circulating in informal trade networks do not represent real, funded demand, we apply a basic verification pass to buyer requirements before actively shopping them to sellers in our network. This typically includes confirming the buyer's corporate registration, checking that the stated payment instrument is consistent with the deal size and structure being proposed, and reviewing whether prior correspondence is internally consistent.

This is not a guarantee — ESA Markets cannot independently verify every claim a buyer makes, and ultimately any seller engaging in a transaction should conduct their own due diligence before committing product. What our process does is filter out the most obvious non-credible inquiries before they consume a seller's time.

Typical Buyer Profiles

Buyer requirements we see most frequently include:

• Independent refineries in Asia-Pacific, the Middle East, and Africa seeking to supplement term contracts with spot cargoes, often to optimise their crude slate for a specific product yield.
• Trading desks covering a short position or building inventory ahead of an anticipated demand shift.
• National or state-linked buyers in import-dependent markets, frequently operating under structured tender or allocation processes.
• Smaller downstream buyers — fuel distributors and blenders — seeking refined products rather than crude, which we route to our EN590 diesel or jet fuel sourcing process instead.

What Happens After You Submit a Requirement

Once a buyer requirement is submitted, our team reviews it for completeness and plausibility, checks it against current seller offers in our network, and follows up — usually by email — either to request additional detail or to confirm that a potential match has been identified. If a match exists, we facilitate an introduction so that you and the seller can begin direct negotiation, supported where useful by our understanding of standard documentation sequencing.

If no match exists immediately, your requirement remains active in our system and may be matched against a seller offer that comes in later. We do not charge buyers for submitting a requirement or for introductions that do not result in a closed transaction.

A Note on Realistic Expectations

The international crude oil market, particularly outside major term contracts, moves on relationships, verified documentation, and patience rather than speed. Buyers who have not worked in this market before sometimes expect same-day confirmation of supply at a fixed price — this is rarely how legitimate transactions unfold. A credible process typically takes days to weeks to move from initial inquiry through document exchange to a signed SPA, and longer for first-time counterparties who are still building trust with each other.

If you are a genuine buyer with a real requirement and the documentation to support it, we encourage you to submit your details below. If you are exploring the market for the first time, our team is also glad to advise on what realistic documentation and timelines look like before you commit time to a specific opportunity.

Spot Cargoes Versus Term Supply Agreements

Buyers approaching the crude oil market generally fall into one of two procurement patterns, and it is worth being clear about which applies to your situation before submitting an inquiry. A spot cargo purchase is a one-off transaction for a specific quantity, typically priced against the prevailing benchmark at the time of agreement, with a defined loading window. Term supply agreements, by contrast, commit a buyer and seller to a recurring delivery schedule — monthly or quarterly — usually over a period of six months to several years, often with pricing formulas tied to a benchmark plus or minus a negotiated differential.

Spot cargoes suit buyers covering an unexpected shortfall, testing a new grade against their refinery configuration, or taking advantage of a favourable pricing window. Term agreements suit buyers seeking supply security and predictable planning, and they typically involve more extensive upfront due diligence on both sides given the longer commitment. When submitting a requirement, indicating clearly which structure you are seeking helps our team match you against the right category of seller — many sellers in our network are oriented toward one structure or the other rather than both.

How Pricing Typically Works

Crude oil transactions outside long-term contracts are almost always priced against a published benchmark — Brent or WTI for most internationally traded grades — plus or minus a differential that reflects the specific grade's quality characteristics, transportation costs, and prevailing supply-demand balance for that grade. Buyers should expect sellers to quote in this format (for example, "Dated Brent minus $2.50/bbl") rather than as a fixed absolute price, since crude oil pricing without benchmark reference is unusual outside of very short-dated spot deals and warrants additional scrutiny.