Eni and Mercuria have agreed to build a jointly owned global trading house whose relevance to Argentina lies in what both partners already control there.
Eni, the Italian energy major, and Mercuria, one of the world's largest independent energy and commodities groups, announced on July 1, 2026 that they had signed an agreement to create a jointly owned commodities trading venture, split 50/50.
The business will operate independently and on an unconsolidated basis through a holding structure based in Geneva, with international trading hubs. Its declared scope covers crude oil, biofuels, gas, LNG and LPG, plus associated logistics and infrastructure rights, and it remains subject to customary regulatory approvals and other closing conditions. The venture aims to begin operating in 2027, according to Reuters.
"The strategic rationale of this joint venture is to expand our trading footprint, enhance profitability for both partners, and generate long-term value through operational efficiency and robust risk management," said Stefano Pujatti, head of Eni's Global Trading, in the company's statement.
Mercuria's chief executive, Marco Dunand, said the partnership brings together "two highly complementary organizations" and would combine "physical energy flows with world-class trading, logistics and risk management capabilities." The joint statement makes no mention of Argentina and gives the venture no local mandate; its Argentine weight is inferred, not declared, and rests on positions the two firms already hold.
A platform based in Geneva
The venture pairs Eni's asset portfolio with the commercial machinery of Mercuria, which operates across the whole value chain, from crude and refined products to gas, LNG, power and carbon markets.
For Eni, the move formalizes a return to trading through a partnership, in line with what chief executive Claudio Descalzi had signaled early in the year. The Italian company already holds a 20% stake in ADNOC Global Trading, alongside ADNOC, Abu Dhabi's state oil company, and Austria's OMV.
Both partners already seated in Argentina
The relevance for the Argentine market comes by another route: both signatories already occupy positions in the country, at complementary links in the chain. Eni is a co-founder of Argentina LNG, the LNG export project it is developing with YPF, Argentina's state-controlled oil and gas company, and XRG, ADNOC's international investment arm, from Vaca Muerta.
The three partners signed a joint development agreement (JDA) in February 2026 and began basic engineering, with a final investment decision (FID) targeted for the second half of 2026. The project envisions 12 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) of LNG, with an option to scale to 18. Eni is also YPF's partner in the offshore OFF-5 block off the coast of Uruguay.
Mercuria, for its part, controls roughly 90% of Phoenix Global Resources, a Vaca Muerta shale producer that filed a $6 billion application to Argentina's Large Investment Incentive Regime (RIGI). In June it also closed the purchase of Raízen's Argentine downstream business for about $1.42 billion, a package that includes the Dock Sud refinery and a network of 894 Shell-branded service stations, completing an integrated model spanning production, refining and retail.
Vaca Muerta crude, the second flow in play
The joint statement lists crude first among the venture's products. In Argentina, that link carries growing weight of its own: oil became the country's leading export product in May 2026, ahead of corn and soy derivatives, according to Argentina's national statistics agency (INDEC).
Most of those Medanito-grade barrels currently travel along the Oleoducto del Valle pipeline to Puerto Rosales, Buenos Aires province, Argentina's primary Atlantic crude export terminal, and from there mainly to Gulf of Mexico refineries.
Mercuria knows that flow closely. Its core business is physical trading, and its producer, Phoenix Global Resources, moves Neuquén output through the expanded Oldelval system. The first export via the Vaca Muerta Oil Sur pipeline (VMOS) is slated for December 2026, opening a new outlet to the Atlantic with an initial capacity of 180,000 barrels per day (bbl/d) and a terminal at Punta Colorada, in Río Negro province, built to load the world's largest crude carriers.
A global trading house with crude among its products is the kind of vehicle that places growing export volumes; Eni added that the independent, unconsolidated structure is meant to speed cash generation from the commercial business, the same logic that pushed Europe's integrated majors back into trading.
The majors return to trading
The Eni deal is the second trading venture Mercuria has signed in 2026, after the one it formed in February with India's Tata International. The move fits a broader trend: Europe's large oil companies have turned back to trading as a source of cash after the market volatility fueled by Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine and, this year, the war in Iran. In parallel, France's TotalEnergies agreed a Middle East trading venture with Bahrain's BAPCO.
For Argentina, the reading is one of overlapping positions. Argentina LNG is still working to close the long-term sales contracts that underpin financing for a development of its scale, and one of its founding partners now sits inside a global LNG-and-crude trading house in Geneva just as the consortium steers toward its investment decision.
The result puts Eni and Mercuria on the same side of the commercial table, with two Argentine flows that until now ran on separate tracks: the Vaca Muerta gas seeking a path to global markets, and the crude that already leads the country's exports.