Opec under pressure as China builds relationships with oil exporters
Launceston, Australia — The shifting dynamics of China’s crude oil imports show the scale of the challenges facing oil cartel Opec and its allies ahead of a decision on whether to continue with production cuts. The detailed Chinese customs data for October illustrates trends that should give pause for thought to the leaders of Opec and its allies, particularly major exporter Russia, ahead of the meeting in Vienna on Thursday. Market share is the big issue for shippers to China, the world’s largest crude importer, and there are two strands to the problem. The first is that the import data shows how China has been able to develop new relationships with oil exporters fairly rapidly, reducing reliance on some traditional suppliers from Opec. The second is that it appears that the burden of reducing exports, at least as far as China is concerned, is not being shared remotely equally by members of Opec and their partners in output cuts. This imbalance raises the chance that an extension t...
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