Chinese lenders step up support for Aramco’s Jafurah project: Four Chinese state-owned banks are providing over a third of the financing for Saudi Aramco’s Jafurah gas project, Reuters reported on Thursday, citing sources it says are in the know. The debt package includes some USD 1 bn each from the Bank of China, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, and China Construction Bank, with around USD 750 mn from the Agricultural Bank of China.

China funds steering clear? Chinese funds reportedly declined an equity stake in the project, following a directive from Beijing to avoid US-linked firms amid ongoing trade tensions, the newswire said. This contrasts with the Chinese players’ participation in the BlackRock-led investment in an Aramco pipeline venture back in 2022.

REFRESHER- A consortium led by BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) acquired a 49% stake in Aramco's Jafurah gas infrastructure through a USD 11 bn lease-and-leaseback agreement in August, forming the Jafurah Midstream Gas Company joint venture with Saudi Aramco (51%). The consortium raised a financing package of nearly USD 10 bn last month to fund the investment.

On Jafurah field: The USD 100 bn Jafurah project contains some 200 tn standardcubic feet of gas across a 17k cbm basin, possibly being the world’s largest shale gas project outside the US, Reuters reported earlier this year. The project is slated to generate over 420 mcf/d of ethane and around 630k barrels of natural gas liquids and condensates per day, according to Aramco’s website.

The project is important to KSA’s midstream ambitions: Aramco’s operations in Jafurah involve a pipeline network spanning 1.5k km of main transfer pipelines, flow lines, and gas-gathering pipelines; a gas processing plant; an NGL fractionation plant; and a gas-compression system, according to Aramco’s website. The Jafurah project will serve the nation’s domestic power plants as well as its export goals, Bloomberg reported earlier this year.

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