The messaging problem: “global gas” is not how Britain actually buys gas

The official line since the energy crisis has been simple. Families and businesses are exposed because fossil-fuel prices are set internationally. After the latest Middle East shock, ministers said Britain had to “get off the fossil fuel rollercoaster” and that “when global gas prices spike, people here shouldn’t be picking up the tab.” Ofgem and […]

Continue Reading

ExxonMobil and SOCAR have moved from study agreements to a 50/50 production-sharing contract for unconventional oil and gas in Azerbaijan’s Middle Kura Basin.

The deal, exchanged on September 26, 2026, at the Second Azerbaijan International Investment Forum in the presence of President Ilham Aliyev, makes ExxonMobil the operator and still needs parliamentary ratification. It is the first time a U.S. supermajor has taken operatorship of an onshore unconventional program in Azerbaijan. The country has spent three decades built […]

Continue Reading

Iran-Linked Oil Tankers Seized by US Navy Now Headed to U.S. Coast

Three sanctioned tankers carrying nearly six million barrels of Iranian crude—valued at roughly $600 million—are crossing the Atlantic toward the United States, according to vessel-tracking data from TankerTrackers and Kpler. The ships, Majestic X, Tifani, and Lenore, were seized months ago in the Indian Ocean as part of a broader U.S. campaign against Iran’s sanctions-evading […]

Continue Reading

Why Are Global Diesel Prices So High? Exhibit A: Ukraine Drone Hits Novoshakhtinsk Refinery

A Ukrainian drone strike on Friday forced Russia’s Novoshakhtinsk refinery in the Rostov region offline, according to regional governor Yury Slyusar. The plant, which processes about 110,000 barrels per day (roughly 5–5.6 million tons per year), is not one of Russia’s giants. It is, however, a clean illustration of why diesel—the workhorse fuel for trucking, […]

Continue Reading

The real story is not that China is “back buying everything.” It is that Beijing throttled demand, shifted suppliers, drew inventories, and is now restocking only where landed cost still works — while $1 million-a-day VLCCs make a return to the old full-cycle buying pattern expensive and unlikely.

That is the argument Javier Blas is making in his September 23 Bloomberg Opinion column, China Isn’t Buying More Oil, It’s Buying From Different Markets (also framed as “Don’t Believe the Hype About China’s Oil Buying”). The global market treated China’s pre-war appetite as a floor. In 2026 it became a valve. The Blas thesis: […]

Continue Reading