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Lukoil said it has accepted an offer from global commodities trading company Gunvor to acquire its foreign assets.
Russia's second-largest oil company is looking to sell its foreign assets after Washington imposed sanctions on it last week.
The planned asset sale is the most significant action yet taken by a Russian company as a result of Western sanctions imposed over the war in Ukraine, which Russia launched in 2022.
Lukoil said in a statement that it has accepted an offer from Gunvor for the sale of Lukoil International GmbH, which controls the Russian oil giant's foreign assets.
"The main terms of the transaction have been previously agreed by the parties. For its part, [Lukoil] has accepted the offer, pledging not to conduct negotiations with other potential buyers," the company said regarding Gunvor's offer.
Gunvor confirmed that it was in talks with Lukoil regarding the possibility of purchasing the assets.
The US Treasury Department has issued a license giving companies until November 21 to complete transactions with Lukoil and Rosneft - another Russian energy company hit by the new round of sanctions.
"If necessary, the parties plan to request an extension of the current license," Lukoil said.
The deal must receive approval from the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the US Treasury Department, Lukoil added.
Gunvor became known in the early 2000s as the world's largest trader of Russian oil.
Shareholders in the company at the time included Gennady Timchenko, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who sold his shares in Gunvor after the US sanctioned it following Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014.
Like many trading companies, Gunvor has benefited greatly from rising oil and gas prices after the war in Ukraine began and Europe took steps to reduce its dependence on Russian energy.
Gunvor and its competitors, Vitol and Trafigura, have used these profits to buy assets in various fields, from refineries and oil fields to thermal power plants.
Lukoil, headquartered in Moscow, accounts for about 2 percent of global oil production.
Its largest asset abroad is the West Qurna 2 oil field – one of the largest in the world – in Iraq, where the company has a 75 percent stake.
Production in the field reached 480,000 barrels per day in April, according to the Russian news agency Interfax.
Lukoil also owns the Lukoil Neftohim Burgas refinery in Bulgaria – the largest refinery in the Balkans – which has a daily production capacity of 190,000 barrels, as well as the Petrotel oil refinery in Romania.
Lukoil supplies oil to Hungary and Slovakia, as well as the STAR refinery in Turkey, which is owned by Azerbaijan's state oil company, SOCAR, and relies heavily on Russian crude.
Lukoil also has stakes in oil terminals and fuel retail networks in Europe, and has oil production and refining projects in Central Asia, Africa and Latin America./ REL
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