The surge has been driven partly by strong demand following the loss of Libya’s 1.6 million barrels of light sweet crude production earlier this year, Socar Trading Chief Executive Valery Golovushkin said on the sidelines of  the Asia Pacific Petroleum Conference (APPEC) in Singapore.

“We are expecting something between $35 billion and $38 billion in revenue this year. In the US, a lot of refiners are used to light sweet crude, so that has helped us increase sales,” Golovushkin said.

“Our competitors are Libyan and Nigerian crude.”

To further expand business, Socar Trading is looking at the downstream assets of Geneva-based Addax Petroleum, Golovushkin said later.

“Only just in August, they released some fresh material about their assets, we’re looking at it,” Golovushkin said on the sidelines of the APPEC.

In July, sources said Addax was looking for buyers for its African oil unit, including its Geneva-based trading unit and storage assets in Africa.

“They have some good assets in Africa,” he said.

“They have some terminals, some retail operations.”

The key product Socar Trading sells is Azeri light crude, sourced from its parent company, a grade similar to that produced in Libya.

The company has also increased the volume it trades through annual term deals globally to around 75 percent, up from 60 percent last year. Around 40 percent of its activity comes from third-party volumes, Golovushkin said.

Socar Trading expects crude sales to Asia to rise to 7-9 million barrels a month by the end of 2011, up from 5-6 million barrels, after it secured storage in South Korea last month.

The company signed a deal to lease underground storage with a capacity of 5 million barrels from Korea National Oil Corporation for two years, with an option to extend for another year. It also has floating storage in the form of a supertanker anchored in Malaysian waters and is looking to lease storage in Singapore.

“With the new storage, our sales in Asia will increase. The first tanker has been loaded and is on the way,” said Golovushkin.

The first phase of a 650,000 cubic meter oil storage terminal the company is building in the UAE port of Fujairah is expected to be operational in November, he said.

Socar Trading expanded its trading of oil products in Asia to include gas oil, jet fuel and naphtha, on top of fuel oil. The Singapore office will have a staff strength of 15 by year-end, including 7 traders — 2 for crude and the rest for products.

The target is to trade around 4 million tons of fuels a year, with fuel oil taking the biggest share, he said.

“We will source fuel oil from all over, India and the Gulf. It will all be third-party trading, not system barrels,” he said.

Socar Trading is also looking to buy refineries in Europe, although their search has been made harder by poor refining margins in that region.

“There are still some negotiations going on, but the progress is not easy,” Golovushkin said.

“Refining is not the best business right now.”