Crude oil edged more than 2% higher on Wednesday, driven primarily by hopes that tensions will ease in the U.S.-China trade conflict and U.S. inventory data.  At 1:28 p.m. ET, Brent crude was trading up 2.09% at $66.02, while the U.S. benchmark, West Texas Intermediate (WTI), was trading up 2.12% at $62.63. A weaker U.S. dollar, bullish inventory data, and renewed hopes for easing U.S.-China trade tensions are all boosting crude today, particularly following a Bloomberg report suggesting China may be open to trade talks—pending specific…

Crude oil edged more than 2% higher on Wednesday, driven primarily by hopes that tensions will ease in the U.S.-China trade conflict and U.S. inventory data.  At 1:28 p.m. ET, Brent crude was trading up 2.09% at $66.02, while the U.S. benchmark, West Texas Intermediate (WTI), was trading up 2.12% at $62.63. A weaker U.S. dollar, bullish inventory data, and renewed hopes for easing U.S.-China trade tensions are all boosting crude today, particularly following a Bloomberg report suggesting China may be open to trade talks—pending specific…

Crude oil edged more than 2% higher on Wednesday, driven primarily by hopes that tensions will ease in the U.S.-China trade conflict and U.S. inventory data.  At 1:28 p.m. ET, Brent crude was trading up 2.09% at $66.02, while the U.S. benchmark, West Texas Intermediate (WTI), was trading up 2.12% at $62.63. A weaker U.S. dollar, bullish inventory data, and renewed hopes for easing U.S.-China trade tensions are all boosting crude today, particularly following a Bloomberg report suggesting China may be open to trade talks—pending specific…

Tehran is ready to ease US concerns over its nuclear activities but scrapping uranium enrichment is off the table, Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said as the two sides prepare for a second round of talks this weekend over Iran's nuclear program. Araqchi told reporters after a weekly cabinet meeting in Tehran on April 16 that Iran’s enrichment is a “real, accepted matter.” “We’re ready to build confidence in response to possible concerns, but the principle of enrichment is nonnegotiable,” he said, days ahead of…

Turkey’s top oil refiner, Tupras, has resumed purchasing Russian Urals crude oil after a brief halt earlier this year prompted by U.S. sanctions on Moscow. According to trading sources and shipping data reviewed by Reuters, the company restarted imports following a drop in Urals prices below the G7's price cap, reaching their lowest point since 2023. Tupras had previously become one of the largest buyers of Russian crude after Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. In the first 11 months of 2024, Russian oil accounted for roughly 65% of Turkey’s…

Turkey’s top oil refiner, Tupras, has resumed purchasing Russian Urals crude oil after a brief halt earlier this year prompted by U.S. sanctions on Moscow. According to trading sources and shipping data reviewed by Reuters, the company restarted imports following a drop in Urals prices below the G7's price cap, reaching their lowest point since 2023. Tupras had previously become one of the largest buyers of Russian crude after Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. In the first 11 months of 2024, Russian oil accounted for roughly 65% of Turkey’s…

U.S. crude oil production is set to peak at around 14 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2027, according to the Annual Energy Outlook 2025 of the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). U.S. oil production is set to remain around the 14 million bpd level by 2030 and in the early 2030s, after which it is expected to decline faster through 2050 as the shale boom fades. Shale-only oil production in the United States will also peak in 2027, the EIA’s outlook says. In two years, shale output would hit its record of 10 million bpd, up from…

Mexico has temporarily suspended imports of fuels from the United States by truck as it is stepping up inspections of permits in a bid to clamp down on illegal fuel trades, sources with knowledge of the matter have told Reuters. As Mexico is stepping up cargo inspections, trucks loaded with diesel and gasoline are currently not being allowed to cross the Texas border into Mexico, according to one of Reuters’ sources involved in the delivery of fuels by truck. Mexican authorities have not yet given a timeline on when fuel trade by road would…

Mexico has temporarily suspended imports of fuels from the United States by truck as it is stepping up inspections of permits in a bid to clamp down on illegal fuel trades, sources with knowledge of the matter have told Reuters. As Mexico is stepping up cargo inspections, trucks loaded with diesel and gasoline are currently not being allowed to cross the Texas border into Mexico, according to one of Reuters’ sources involved in the delivery of fuels by truck. Mexican authorities have not yet given a timeline on when fuel trade by road would…

Mexico has temporarily suspended imports of fuels from the United States by truck as it is stepping up inspections of permits in a bid to clamp down on illegal fuel trades, sources with knowledge of the matter have told Reuters. As Mexico is stepping up cargo inspections, trucks loaded with diesel and gasoline are currently not being allowed to cross the Texas border into Mexico, according to one of Reuters’ sources involved in the delivery of fuels by truck. Mexican authorities have not yet given a timeline on when fuel trade by road would…

Crude oil inventories in the United States saw an increase of 500,000 barrels during the week ending April 11, according to new data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration released on Wednesday. Crude oil prices were trading up in a rare show of strength prior to the crude data release by the U.S. Energy Information Administration after a sharp dip over the last couple of weeks in the wake of the tariff war between the United States and China. On Tuesday, the American Petroleum Institute (API) reported a build of 2.4 million barrels in…

U.S. LNG exporter Venture Global has started contractual deliveries from its first LNG export project, Calcasieu Pass, to its long-term customers amid an ongoing dispute with major oil and gas firms over the delays to the official commercial operations date at the export project. Venture Global said that Calcasieu Pass has reached the commercial operations milestone in just 68 months from the final investment decision (FID) on the project, making it among the fastest greenfield LNG projects completed. According to Venture Global, the start of commercial…

U.S. LNG exporter Venture Global has started contractual deliveries from its first LNG export project, Calcasieu Pass, to its long-term customers amid an ongoing dispute with major oil and gas firms over the delays to the official commercial operations date at the export project. Venture Global said that Calcasieu Pass has reached the commercial operations milestone in just 68 months from the final investment decision (FID) on the project, making it among the fastest greenfield LNG projects completed. According to Venture Global, the start of commercial…

Ahead of tonight's grand unveiling of what Beijing wants the world to think about its economy, the market was active with Gold soaring at the China open for the third day in a row... ...and the Yuan fix notably lower again... Ahead of the GDP print, we saw both new and existing home prices released by the statistics bureau for March showing price drops have slowed on a month-on-month basis... China March New Home Prices Fall 0.08% M/M China March Existing Home Prices Fall 0.23% M/M Of course, tonight's data tsunami is pre-Liberation Day Tariffs…

Thailand is the latest Asian economy looking to import higher volumes of American energy as a way to convince the U.S. Administration not to slap high tariffs on Thai goods sold in the United States. Thailand plans to raise its U.S. LNG imports over the next five years, Finance Minister Pichai Chunhavajira said on Wednesday. Delegations from many Asian countries are heading to Washington D.C. these days to discuss the U.S. tariffs, now suspended for 90 days, which hit the most economies in Asia and Southeast Asia, including Thailand. The tariff…

Thailand is the latest Asian economy looking to import higher volumes of American energy as a way to convince the U.S. Administration not to slap high tariffs on Thai goods sold in the United States. Thailand plans to raise its U.S. LNG imports over the next five years, Finance Minister Pichai Chunhavajira said on Wednesday. Delegations from many Asian countries are heading to Washington D.C. these days to discuss the U.S. tariffs, now suspended for 90 days, which hit the most economies in Asia and Southeast Asia, including Thailand. The tariff…

The eight OPEC+ countries that have been cutting oil production will have to compensate 4.57 million barrels per day (bpd) in overproduction so far, and the compensation plans entail offsetting all above-quota output by June 2026. Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Algeria, and Oman have submitted their individual compensation plans to OPEC, the cartel said on Wednesday. Source: OPEC Since the very first OPEC+ agreement in 2016, OPEC and its non-OPEC allies have been struggling with overproduction from several…

Previously, we reported that the ESG investing boom of yesteryears has gone bust. Environmental, social and governance (ESG) investing spiked in 2020 and 2021 amid the COVID-19 pandemic with low oil prices driving more investments beyond fossil fuels, while fund managers tried to appear more climate-conscious. However, the oil price boom of 2022/2023, political backlash against ESG led by Republican politicians as well as claims about greenwashing have made ESG investing lose plenty of luster.  To wit, Texas has barred state entities, including…

“The sky won’t fall,” the spokesman of China’s customs authority said this week, referring to President Trump’s trade war in China, just as the authority reported an over 12% jump in exports for March. China is preparing to respond to the tariffs—by going gray in trade. The New York Times reported this week that there is a growing fear in Europe that China may start redirecting its cheap, subsidized products to European markets in response to U.S. tariffs. Examples included electric cars, steel—which Europe…

The fact that U.S. President Donald Trump ordered a pause on the raft of new tariffs against most of the world’s countries – but not on most of those directed at China – highlights what these new levies are really all about. They are in large part specifically aimed at finally correcting a longstanding imbalance in the trade deficit between the U.S. and China since the Ccmmunist country developed a capitalist twist in the 1990s under former leader Deng Xiaoping. This gap has become increasingly more dramatic through China’s…