AMMAN (Dow Jones)--Iraq's State Oil Marketing Organization, or SOMO awarded over 2 million barrels of Kirkuk crude oil in its 13th and final tender for 2007, a senior Iraqi oil official said Friday.
The official said that the crude was awarded to ExxonMobil Corp. (XOM), Jetbase Enterprises Ltd. and a third company which he didn't name. He didn't say how much each company would lift.
SOMO originally tendered to sell 6 million barrels of Kirkuk crude, but New Year holidays have prevented companies from bidding to buy Kirkuk crude, the official told Dow Jones Newswires. SOMO wants the winning companies to lift the crude by the end of Jan. 15.
From the beginning of this month, SOMO, has started selling Kirkuk crude oil through term contracts signed with 11 European and U.S. firms, each lasting three months.
SOMO said that it would soon increase Kirkuk crude oil exports from current 300,000 barrels a day to around 400,000 barrels a day. It said it had invited reliable U.S. companies to lift the additional Kirkuk crude.