Hungary’s MOL agrees to buy Serbian refiner NIS from Gazprom

The Hungarian oil and gas group MOL has signed a binding Heads of Agreement with Russia’s Gazprom Neft to acquire its 56.15% stake in the Serbian oil company Naftna Industrija Srbije (NIS), reinforcing its position in the Bakans (MOL press release, 19/01/2026). The two companies aim to sign the sales and purchase agreement in March 2026. The completion of the transaction requires, among others, the approval of OFAC (the United States of America’s Office of Foreign Assets Control) and other Governmental and State approvals in Serbia.

In January 2025, the United States announced sanctions against Gazprom, but for NIS, their application was postponed several times before coming into effect in October 2025. In early 2026, the Serbian company secured a sanction waiver until 23 January 2026.

Once the transaction is completed, MOL will own and operate Serbia’s only refinery, Pančevo (4.8 Mt/year, or 96,000 bbl/d), which primarily produces  Euro-5 quality diesel and gasoline fuels compliant with EU standards, LNG, petrochemical products, heating oil, bitumen, and other petroleum products. NIS produced 3.7 Mt of oil products in 2024. In addition, NIS controls 400 service stations across Serbia, Romania, and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Finally, in the upstream segment, the company has around 173 Mboe of probable reserves, with an oil and gas output in Serbia reaching 20,000 boe/d. It also holds exploration licences in Romania and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

MOL already controls the Duna refinery (8.1 Mt/year) in Hungary, and holds stakes in refineries abroad, namely Bratislava (6.1 Mt/year, 100%) in Slovakia and Rijeka (4.5 Mt/year) in Croatia through its 49% stake in Croatia's national oil company INA, with a total production of 16.1 Mt in 2024. The Hungarian group owns more than 2,500 services stations across 11 countries, including Croatia, Hungary, Poland, Czechia, Slovakia and Romania. It sold 18.3 Mt of oil products in 2024, with 9.3 Mt of exports.