Cheniere Energy Inc said on Friday that it has signed a deal to sell liquefied natural gas to China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC), China's first long-term contract to import US LNG.

When US President Donald Trump visited Beijing in November, he took two US LNG executives with him, including Jack Fusco, president and CEO of Cheniere. During that visit, Cheniere signed a memorandum of understanding with CNPC to eventually enter LNG export contracts. Cheniere has sold LNG to China on spot-based contracts since it began US exports in 2016.

Under the deal, CNPC's PetroChina International Co Ltd subsidiary will purchase about 1.2 million tons per year of LNG under two agreements with a portion of the supply beginning in 2018 and the balance in 2023, Cheniere said in a statement.

The agreements continue through 2043 for the purchase of LNG indexed to the US natural gas benchmark price plus a fixed component.

Cheniere operates the only big LNG export facility operating in the United States at Sabine Pass in Louisiana. It said on Friday that it will ship the LNG for China from its Corpus Christ export terminal under construction in Texas.

The combination of the CNPC agreement and a 15-year deal announced in January to to Swiss commodity trader Trafigura moves Cheniere closer to making a final decision on whether to build a third liquefaction train at Corpus Christi, analysts at US financial services firm Cowen & Co said in a report.

"Cheniere will generate enough discretionary cash flow (about $4 billion) through 2021 to finance construction without project financing," Cowen said, noting the third train would cost about $2.5 billion to build.

"We expect these agreements to support the development of Corpus Christi Train 3, and we are now focused on completing the remaining necessary steps to reach a final investment decision later this year," Fusco, Cheniere's Fusco said in a statement.

REUTERS