China Capitalizing on Crashed Oil Market, Stockpiling Oil

originally posted by: paraphi
a reply to: ufoorbhunter

The problem is that the FSU don't want to be dealing with Russia. They are sovereign states who don't want to be under the heel of Russia, the old oppressor and current antagonist. They prefer the liberal developed world and all the opportunities that brings.

Maybe that's the case with the Baltics states and the west very west of Ukraine but not most of the FSU. Armenia, Belarus, Kazachstan, indeed many of the central Asian FSU are very allied to Russia in many ways be it power grids, culture, defence against ISIS, economics having shared industries and co-operation in many fields. There is much brain washing in the West into believing the FSU is totally anti Russia but it is not actually the truth on the ground.

Trump spoke with the Saudis and the Texas Railroad Commissioner spoke to the Russians about cutting production by 10-15 million barrels per day. The talks apparently went well and the price of oil rose to $25.51 for WTI and $29.83 for Brent crude.

originally posted by: Lumenari
a reply to: Scapegrace

It’s really hurting our fracking industry, which I’ve heard, needs about $45 a barrel to break even.

In the Bakken oilfield the cost to market price is roughly $34 a barrel for oil.

Although the biggest problem isn't actually the oil itself right now, it's that to produce oil you have to get rid of the natural gas while you are producing...

And right now oil companies are having to pay to get the nat gas offsite.

So wellsites are being shuttered in, drilling schedules have been cancelled, things are pretty bad for the entire industry right now.

With no real end in site...

This may mean another couple year shutdown for the oil industry.

But don't worry.. it's just 8% of our GDP.

My sister was pointing out that this is going to be great for everyone else, with $1 a gallon gas prices again.

Till I pointed out that it's not going to really matter that much if you don't have a job to drive to.

I hate to see all that lovely natural gas go to waste, but I suppose it’s not economical to build a gathering system or whatever they call it.

Yeah, seems like most folks feel that China scooping up oil at the price is just smart shopping, and not indicative of any significant change or strategy by China. I tend to agree, but was wondering if this might be perceived as a good or bad omen.

It baffles me why US & Russia haven't developed closer ties since the end of the Cold War. I know the argument in some quarters is that the MIC simply won't allow US to disengage from arms race against Russia. It used to be a contest on who could stockpile the biggest nuclear arsenal; now we just have to "settle" for competing over our respective conventional weaponry collections, with an $1bn fighter jet platform mixed in every so often.

I also know that US politicians always use relations with Russia to their advantage, either to portray their competitors as too hawkish (Obama's sound bite "Hey Mitt, the 1980s called; they want their foreign policy back"), or not hawkish enough (the Democrats in '16, and not just Dems, I believe Lindsey Graham has often drummed up tension with the Russians in the past).

A ways back, I read a story in the NYT (back before it was turning into the Identity Politics Journal) about how expats and exiles from Russia whom were retained by CIA would often take an active hand in shaping our policies WRT to Russia. That really got a chuckle out of me. What better way to forge a stronger relationship with Russia than to bring analysts and handlers in who had an axe to grind with Russia.