ADNOC Reportedly Eyes Dangote Refinery Stake in Global Expansion

BREAKING NEWSSeptember 7, 2026 at 7:13 PM UTC

TLDR

ADNOC in talks to buy stakes in refining businesses in Nigeria and Thailand for increased crude customer base and expansion in fuel trading.
Potential deal with PTT could involve crude supply to refineries and sale of refined fuels to boost trading business.
Dangote Petroleum Refinery in Nigeria preparing for Africa's largest IPO, planning refinery capacity doubling to 1.4 million barrels/day by 2029.

Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. is in talks to buy stakes in refining businesses in Nigeria and Thailand as the state-owned producer seeks more customers for its crude and a larger role in fuel trading. The discussions include Nigeria’s Dangote Petroleum Refinery and refineries operated by units of Thailand’s PTT.

A deal with PTT could include agreements for ADNOC to supply crude to the refineries and receive refined fuels that it could sell to other buyers. The structure would give ADNOC demand for its crude while increasing the volume of gasoline, diesel and other products available to its trading business. The talks remain private and may not result in transactions.

In Nigeria, ADNOC is discussing an investment in Dangote’s refining operations as the company prepares Africa’s largest IPO. Dangote signed offering documents on September 7 for a sale of 4.1 billion shares at ₦525 each. The offer, scheduled for September 14 to October 13, could raise about ₦2.15 trillion, or $1.63 billion, before any additional shares are issued.

Dangote plans to use capital to help double its Lagos refinery’s capacity from 700,000 barrels a day to 1.4 million by 2029. The expansion is expected to cost about $14.3 billion. The refinery reported $1.82 billion of profit after tax in the first half of 2026 after a $476 million loss in 2025.

For ADNOC, an investment would extend a strategy that already includes crude trading in Africa and fuel sales into markets such as Kenya and Ethiopia. The company is also expanding outside oil production through gas, chemicals and fuel retail assets in several markets.

Key Takeaways

A stake in Dangote would give ADNOC something different from simply selling more crude: a position inside one of Africa’s largest fuel-production businesses. ADNOC produces large volumes of crude in the UAE but wants more control over where that oil is processed and how the resulting fuels are traded. Dangote offers both. Its Lagos plant can process 700,000 barrels a day, exports products to Africa and Europe and plans to double capacity to 1.4 million barrels a day. That expansion will require more crude, making a producer such as ADNOC a possible supply partner as well as a shareholder. The timing also matters because Dangote is opening its IPO while seeking capital for the $14.3 billion expansion. An ADNOC investment could add another institutional investor and create a long-term crude supply relationship, although Nigeria wants the refinery to process more domestic oil. For ADNOC, similar talks with PTT show that the strategy is not limited to Africa. The company is building a network in which it can supply crude, own parts of refineries and trade the fuels they produce. That could reduce its dependence on its Ruwais refinery in the UAE and give it more control over margins across the oil value chain.

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