China halts U.S. LNG imports for longest since last trade war
The geopolitical conflict is beginning to decouple the world’s biggest LNG seller and buyer
China hasn’t imported liquefied natural gas from the United States for 60 days, the longest gap in five years, as worsening relations between Beijing and Washington lead the nation’s buyers to divert shipments.
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No U.S. shipments are currently heading to China, according Kpler, an analytics firm that tracks ship data.
During U.S. President Donald Trump’s first term, China didn’t take a shipment from the U.S. for about 400 days through April 2020, according to ship-tracking data compiled by Bloomberg.
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“Zero LNG trade between China and the U.S. is likely to continue for the rest of 2025, with a further increase in China’s tariff on U.S. LNG from the previous 15 per cent to 49 per cent, as a counterstrike against Trump’s steepest tariffs,” said Wei Xiong, head of China gas research at Rystad Energy. “In the meantime, we expect to see more reselling by Chinese companies,” she added.
The current geopolitical conflict is beginning to decouple the world’s biggest LNG seller and buyer. Beijing slapped a 15 per cent tariff on U.S. LNG shipments from Feb. 10 in retaliation to American levies, which was further exacerbated last week by another set of Chinese levies on all imports from the U.S.
Chinese LNG buyers receive U.S. shipments under binding long-term contracts. The past mild winter and robust inventories mean that China isn’t in any dire need of LNG, giving the country’s traders more flexibility to resell U.S. supply to rivals in Europe and Asia.
The move has been a relief for Europe, which needed more LNG to refill inventories and replace the loss of Russian pipeline gas deliveries.
— With assistance from Sing Yee Ong.
Bloomberg.com
