“Premier Li Qiang is expected to repeat last year’s growth target of about 5 per cent, but in the absence of last year’s tailwind from the pandemic rebound, that will be hard to achieve,” said Taylor Nugent, a senior economist at National Australia Bank. China is the biggest hurdle for OPEC’s policy
Cecile Lefort
Commonwealth Bank predicts that China will be the biggest hurdle to the oil cartel policy.
The International Energy Agency expects Chinese oil demand, which accounts for around 60 per cent of global sales, to grow 4 per cent to 4.5 per cent this year. State‑owned China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) has a more modest outlook, forecasting only 1 per cent gain this year as China’s post-pandemic growth continues to fade and electric vehicles (EV) sales accelerate.
“EV uptake and increasing energy efficiency are likely to suppress global oil demand more broadly beyond 2024 – especially with EV production costs expected to fall given the sharp fall in battery mineral prices like lithium over the last year,” said Vivek Dhar, a mining and energy commodities strategist at CBA.
