US sanctions against Russian oil giants Rosneft and LUKoil have sent shockwaves across global energy markets and left China’s largest state oil companies pausing their imports of Russian crude.
Despite being now exposed to crippling penalties if it deals with the sanctioned Russian companies, China – one of Russia’s top customers – has its own playbook to deal with the impact, experts say.
China has already been stockpiling oil, shielding itself from potential disruption for months, and Chinese oil firms could find ways to navigate sanctions and continue bringing in discounted Russian oil.
A halt in Chinese imports of Russian crude could put a major strain on Moscow’s oil revenues as the administration of US President Donald Trump looks to ramp up pressure on the Kremlin as part of its efforts to broker a negotiated end to war in Ukraine.
The US sanctions announced on October 22 cut off the Russian companies from American banking systems, preventing them from operating in US dollars. Violators can face stiff penalties, including secondary sanctions.
But analysts say the impact of the US sanctions will largely depend on how strictly they are enforced and if Washington is prepared to impose secondary sanctions on countries that continue to do business with Rosneft and LUKoil.
“It is unclear yet whether the United States will match the threat of secondary sanctions with actual enforcement of the new sanctions measures it has already enacted,” David Goldwyn, a former US special envoy for international energy affairs and Andrea Clabough, fellow at the Atlantic Council, wrote for the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based think tank, on October 23.
“Chinese refiners are already well practiced in evading US sanctions, for their part, and can usually find workarounds if they still want these Russian cargoes at bargain-basement prices.”
How Much Russian Oil Does China Buy?
China relies heavily on Russian oil imports. Rosneft and LUKoil supplied about one-quarter of Russia’s oil exports to China last year, according to data analytics firm Kpler.
As much as 20 percent of China’s crude imports – roughly 2 million barrels a day in the first nine months of 2025 – came from Russia, making it one of the country’s leading sources of oil for processing into products such as diesel, gasoline, and plastics.
And since the European Union cut most oil imports from Russia in late 2022, China has purchased around 47 percent of Russia’s oil and India has bought 38 percent, according to the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air.
Most of China’s oil purchases from Russia are delivered by sea, and energy analysts say that Rosneft and LUKoil sell most of their oil to China through intermediaries instead of directly dealing with buyers.
According to Reuters, Chinese national oil companies PetroChina, Sinopec, CNOOC, and Zhenhua Oil will refrain from buying Russian seaborne oil, and independent refiners are also expected to pause purchases as they assess the impact of sanctions.
The new sanctions mean that buyers will be reluctant to buy Russian oil directly, forcing the companies to rely on longer chains of intermediaries to charter tankers and sell their oil, which brings about extra costs and complications.
But it’s unclear how long this suspension will last.
It’s also uncertain how the sanctions will impact the approximately 900,000 barrels per day of Russian oil by pipeline imported into China. That flows through a long-term contract between Rosneft and state-owned China National Petroleum Corporation.
What Has Beijing Said So Far About US Oil Sanctions?
Beijing pushed back against the US move, with Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun saying on October 23 that “China consistently opposes unilateral sanctions that lack a basis in international law and have not been authorized by the United Nations Security Council.”
The EU separately agreed to a phased ban on the import of Russian liquefied natural gas, and added two Chinese oil refiners – Liaoyang Petrochemical and Shandong Yulong Petrochemical – to its sanctions list.
Beijing said it also lodged protests with Brussels over the move.
“China strongly deplores and firmly rejects the EU’s repeated illicit unilateral sanctions against Chinese companies over Russia-related issues,” Guo said. “We have stressed on multiple occasions that China did not create the Ukraine crisis, nor is China a party to it.”
Will China Be Able To Still Buy Russian Oil?
The reach of US sanctions is vast and losing access to the US financial system could be an existential threat to many large Chinese banks and conglomerates.
“The Trump administration’s best bet is to make a few high-profile examples of sanctions’ enforcement, while simultaneously promising China and India that they will not be cut off from Russian oil for very long – if [Russian President Vladimir] Putin comes to the negotiating table,” Goldwyn and Clabough wrote in their report for the Atlantic Council.
Russia has a month to prepare before the restrictions take full effect in late November, and along with Chinese entities, have several moves to avert a worst-case scenario.
Moscow has long found ways to evade Western sanctions through opaque trading schemes as well as its “shadow fleet” network, which relies on ageing vessels sailing under obscure flags and managed through shell companies in the Middle East and Asia.
Since Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Beijing has limited its big banks’ transactions involving Russia and Russian firms. In the past, China has used smaller banks with limited exposure to the Western financial system and the broader Chinese economy to conduct business with sanctioned suppliers, such as oil imports from Iran.
China also appears to have been stockpiling oil since the beginning of the year.
While Beijing doesn’t publish precise figures on its oil reserves, analysts at the US bank JPMorgan have said that their calculations show that roughly a million barrels a day were put away for future use.
Their estimates show that China’s inventories currently sit at 1.25 billion barrels and are projected to reach 1.5 billion barrels next year, allowing Beijing to weather a short pause as it assesses the impact of the sanctions. For comparison, the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve currently holds 831 million barrels.
