Rosneft Submits Morgan Stanley Deal for U.S. Security Review - WSJ

Russia's Rosneft has submitted details of a deal to buy an oil trading unit of Morgan Stanley to a confidential U.S. committee that evaluates national security risks.

Morgan Stanley agreed to sell the majority of its global physical oil trading operations to state-owned Rosneft in December, before Russia launched an incursion into Ukraine's Crimean peninsula.

Industry watchers have expressed doubts the deal will go through due to Western sanctions on Russian officials, including Rosneft's head Igor Sechin, over the Ukraine crisis.

"We're strategically committed to that transaction ... and we plan to close it," Morgan Stanley Chief Executive James Gorman told reporters after its annual shareholder meeting on May 13. He said then he would not speculate on whether geopolitical conditions would deteriorate.

Rosneft also said in April that it aimed to complete the deal in the second half of 2014.

(downstreamtoday.comEdited by Topco)