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Wray Says China Hacking, Pressure Put Americans "Over a Barrel" (Bloomberg) -- The Chinese government uses an extensive array of tactics to steal U.S. trade secrets and influence U.S. politics, FBI Director Christopher Wray said. Wray also offered a time-honored suggestion to anyone who believes they're being manipulated or threatened by China: Call the local office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, he said. [Extracted from the article]

(Bloomberg) -- Oil was anchored near $33 a barrel as an escalating war of words between the U.S. and China added to caution over the prospects for a global recovery in demand. See also: Oil's Sudden Rebound Is Exposing the Achilles' Heel of Shale However, there are signs the oil market is positioning itself for a recovery. [Extracted from the article]

(Bloomberg) -- Oil extended the worst start to a year since 1991 after China's oil consumption was said to plunge by 20% amid efforts to control the spread of coronavirus. Russian President Vladimir Putin and Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz spoke by phone and confirmed their readiness to continue cooperation to keep the global oil market stable, the Kremlin said in a statement. [Extracted from the article]

The article reports that oil tanker owners are raising the prices they charge to export Middle East crude as tensions surge in a region that accounts for about a third of all seaborne petroleum shipments. Topics include rates for transporting 2 million-barrel cargoes from Saudi Arabia to China jumped to almost 26,000 dollars a day as per the Baltic Exchange in London, England.

Saudi Arabia has traditionally had a lock on Asian oil markets. State-owned Saudi Aramco is looking at multi-billion-dollar deals to buy marketing, refining and retail assets from China's CNPC, Bloomberg News reported earlier this month. [Extracted from the article]

A Chinese fighter jet in international waters buzzed a U.S. Navy surveillance aircraft within 20 feet and did a barrel roll over it in what the White House called a provocation. The most serious encounter between a Chinese fighter and U.S. aircraft was an April 2001 collision with a Navy EP-3 surveillance plane. [Extracted from the article]

The article describes several oil shale projects (OSP) worldwide. One is QER Pty. Ltd.'s purchase of an OS resource base in Queensland that holds about 16 billion barrels of oil. Another is Eesti Energia's plan to construct a new shale oil (SO) plant in Estonia and to increase the sale of SO to 500,000 tons per year by 2010. In China, planned OSP are in Jilin, Guangdong, Heilongjiang, and Gansu provinces.