Sinopec Corp, Asia's largest refiner, and rival PetroChina Co Ltd are poised to seek assets overseas to diversify as domestic earnings are depressed by State-controlled prices for processed fuels.
Meanwhile, offshore oil producer CNOOC Ltd is stepping up its latest acquisition bid overseas.
Financial analysts cautioned that the spending spree may not bring the intended results to the business groups as asset acquisition may meet fierce political resistance.
Refining losses resulted in Sinopec reporting a 40.5 percent decline in first-half net income to 24.5 billion yuan ($3.85 billion) on Sunday.
The nation's biggest oil and gas producer PetroChina last week said first-half profit declined 6 percent to 62 billion yuan.
The country's leading offshore oil producer CNOOC Ltd saw its net profit in the same period tumble 19 percent to 31.87 billion yuan.
"The loss came purely from the government's policy of capping retail fuel prices," said Laban Yu, head of Asia oil & gas equity research at Jefferies Hong Kong Ltd. "There is not much Sinopec can do. We believe current low inflation will allow higher refiner margins in the second half and quite possibly a change in the fuel-pricing mechanism."
To combat the declining profit growth, the three oil energy producers all strived to increase their overseas energy business portion to offset the sluggishness in the domestic energy market.
PetroChina said it plans to generate more than half its oil and gas output from overseas projects by 2020 to offset refining losses, while China Petrochemical Corp, Sinopec's State-owned parent, said it will more than double its foreign production by 2015.
