China's Largest Oil Refiner Sees Almost No Throughput Growth

China's largest oil refining company, China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., aka Sinopec, processed 126.69 million metric tons of crude oil or 5.08 million barrels per day (bpd) in the first six months of the current year, good for a mere 0.1% Y/Y increase, the company has reported. That compared with 1.7% output growth in the first quarter, pointing to a sharp slowdown in processing in the second quarter thanks to higher crude prices and lackluster domestic fuel demand. Sinopec reported that total domestic refined fuel sales declined 2.5%…