Crude oil climbs on strong U.S. jobs data and renewed China trade talks
Crude oil prices increased on Friday, marking the first weekly gain in three weeks. This rise followed a positive U.S. jobs report and renewed trade discussions between the U.S. and China. Brent crude futures settled at $66.47 a barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude finished at $64.58. OPEC+ agreed to increase output by 411,000 barrels per day in July.
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Crude rose more than $1 a barrel on Friday, posting its first weekly gain in three weeks after a favorable U.S. jobs report and resumed trade talks between the U.S. and China, raising hopes for growth in the world's two largest economies. Brent crude futures settled at $66.47 a barrel, up $1.13, or 1.73%. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude finished at $64.58, up $1.21 or 1.91%.Both benchmarks settled with weekly gains after declining for two straight weeks. Brent has advanced 2.75% this week, while WTI is trading 4.9% higher."I think the jobs report was Goldilocks," said Phil Flynn, senior analyst with the Price Futures Group. "It was not too hot, not too cold but just right to increase the chances for an interest rate cut by the Federal Reserve."The U.S. Labor Department's monthly employment report showed the unemployment rate held steady at 4.2% last month. Employers added 139,000 jobs, which combined with downward revisions to prior months' estimates showed a cooling in labor demand but nothing abrupt; by comparison, monthly job gains averaged 160,000 last year.A rate cut by the U.S. central bank, much desired by President Donald Trump, could boost economic growth and demand for petroleum."This market had priced in a lot of bad options," said John Kilduff, partner with Again Capital. "None of it has come to pass. OPEC+ held the line. There have been talks between China and the U.S., though the details are sketchy, at least they didn't fly apart like Elon (Musk) and Donald (Trump)."China's official Xinhua news agency said trade talks between Xi and Trump took place at Washington's request on Thursday. Trump said the call had led to a "very positive conclusion", adding the U.S. was "in very good shape with China and the trade deal".The oil market continued to swing with news on tariff negotiations and data showing how trade uncertainty and the impact of the U.S. levies are flowing through into the global economy.On Saturday, OPEC+, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies including Russia, agreed to ramp up output by a previously announced 411,000 barrels per day (bpd) in July. The group rejected a Saudi recommendation for a bigger output hike, part of a broader strategy to win back market share for OPEC+."The market looks balanced in 2Q/3Q on our estimates as oil demand rises in summer and peaks in July-August, matching supply increases from OPEC+," HSBC said in a note.The U.S. oil and gas rig count, an early indicator of future output, fell by four to 559 in the week to June 6, the lowest since November 2021, energy services firm Baker Hughes said on Friday.Oil rigs fell by nine to 442 this week, while gas rigs rose by five to 114, Baker Hughes said.
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Time of India
an hour ago
- Time of India
Buyer with ties to Chinese Communist Party got VIP treatment at Trump crypto dinner
The Trump White House has repeatedly sounded an alarm about visitors with ties to China's Communist Party coming to the United States, arguing that they are a potential security threat. But the administration appears to have literally left the door open to a member of a Chinese government group when it went along with a plan to give the biggest purchasers of President Donald Trump's digital currency access to the president and the White House. Trump launched a so-called meme coin, a type of cryptocurrency, just days before his inauguration. To bolster sales, the president's business partners created a contest in April, offering the coin's top buyers a tour of the White House and a private dinner with Trump at his Virginia golf club. Play Video Pause Skip Backward Skip Forward Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration 0:00 Loaded : 0% 0:00 Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 1x Playback Rate Chapters Chapters Descriptions descriptions off , selected Captions captions settings , opens captions settings dialog captions off , selected Audio Track default , selected Picture-in-Picture Fullscreen This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Opacity Opaque Semi-Transparent Text Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Opacity Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Caption Area Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Opacity Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Drop shadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like If You Eat Ginger Everyday for 1 Month This is What Happens Tips and Tricks One of those buyers was He Tianying, who is a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, according to government documents in China examined by The New York Times. That government group, referred to as the CPPCC, is an advisory body that seeks to broaden the Communist Party's influence and solicit support from influential people in Chinese society. Live Events He, who was registered at the Trump event as a resident of Hong Kong, advises the Chinese government through his role as a delegate of the Fangshan CPPCC, a district of Beijing. He is listed as a member of the organization's science and technology committee. The Times could find no indication that He is a member of the Communist Party, and the government body he serves on is fairly low-level. Discover the stories of your interest Blockchain 5 Stories Cyber-safety 7 Stories Fintech 9 Stories E-comm 9 Stories ML 8 Stories Edtech 6 Stories There were no restrictions on who could buy the Trump meme coin -- which was marketed like a collectible baseball card -- including foreign nationals. But the winning buyers were given the opportunity for close proximity to the president. It is not clear why He wanted to attend. Still, at a time when the administration is seeking to scrutinize and revoke the visas of Chinese students with ties to the Communist Party, the incident illustrates inconsistencies in the Trump administration's approach to how it handles Chinese nationals, as well as potential weaknesses in the background checks the Trump administration did on the guests who bought his meme coin. Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said in an interview that the dinner was a private event and that government officials were not closely involved. "As the White House has always maintained, this was not an official White House event," she said. Once a crypto skeptic, Trump has done an about-face and declared himself a digital coin enthusiast, raising ethical concerns and blurring the line between his personal business ventures and the presidency. His family's company has issued its own cryptocurrency, and he has also heavily promoted the meme coin, known as $TRUMP. The meme coin dinner engendered strong criticism from Democrats, government watchdogs and even some Republicans about the appearance of monetising the presidency for personal gain. The event was arranged by the president's business partners to directly enrich the first family, even as Trump spoke that evening behind a stand emblazoned with the presidential seal. Bidders competed to accumulate the largest holding of the coin over several weeks. The top 220 won a dinner with Trump, and the top 25 also got a "VIP" tour of the White House. The buyers used self-adopted nicknames that disguised their identities, but the Times obtained copies of several pages of an official sign-in sheet for the dinner and over the past two weeks has been examining the biographies of many of the attendees. He, using the nickname Sky, owned $3.7 million worth of the meme coin, public transaction records show, at the time the contest ended. He was ranked as the seventh-largest buyer of the cryptocurrency, which entitled him to a gold-colored VIP wristband for the event. The day after the dinner at Trump's golf club, He was observed by a reporter from the Times entering the White House for the tour that had been set up by Trump's business partner Bill Zanker, who created the Trump meme coin. Zanker and the Trump family share in the revenues from the meme coin business, which has already totaled at least $320 million, according to an estimate by Chainalysis, a crypto forensics group. After the tour, He, using a social media account under his Sky pseudonym, posted a series of photos from the dinner and White House tour, which he electronically modified to cover his face. The Times was able to establish his identity through publicly available information, including photos and biographical information on his company website. He made several waves of purchases during the three weeks of the meme coin contest, according to the transaction records. "May I have the pleasure?" he wrote in one social media post, showing off his standing as one of the top owners of the meme coin, several days before the contest ended. He declined to comment as he entered the White House, and he did not respond to follow-up emails, calls and text messages from the Times. The dinner invitation sent to He stands in contrast to the statement Trump issued Wednesday, arguing that his administration needed to urgently move to block visas for certain Chinese nationals, including those attending Harvard University, as "the Chinese Communist Party has sent thousands of midcareer and senior bureaucrats" to the United States. He said this order was for "crucial national security reasons." A senior White House official, who asked not to be named because of the sensitive nature of the matter, said this week that the presence of He at the dinner and White House tour was unfortunate and that overall, the meme coin dinner had created unnecessary questions. But the White House official added that it had occurred because Trump "carelessly committed" to his longtime friend and business partner Zanker that he would be a part of it. The official added that Trump was not notified who would be attending and was unaware of He's background. Supporting the party The mission of the Fangshan District division of the CPPCC, which lists He as a member, is to "uphold the overall leadership of the Communist Party of China and strengthen the common ideological and political foundation," the group says in describing one of its meetings this year. CPPCC committees are advisory bodies to China's rubber-stamp legislatures at the national, provincial and, like Fangshan, district or county levels. Members can make policy recommendations to the legislative bodies, called People's Congresses. These committees are part of the Communist Party's United Front system, which is devised to co-opt broad segments of the population, including entrepreneurs like He, into supporting and carrying out the party's policies. The CPPCC bodies also act as networking clubs. "When you are a CPPCC member, you are expected to be a part of the United Front system and carry the water where the party asks you to," said Peter Mattis, the president of the Washington-based Jamestown Foundation who studies the United Front. The Times turned up documentation on Chinese government websites showing He's participation in the CPPCC group, as well as an attendance list for the committee's gathering in Beijing in January that included He's name. Chinese government records show that He is the majority owner of a Beijing-based investment firm, TechSharpe (Beijing) Capital Management Co., which says on its website that it uses artificial intelligence to "conduct quantitative investment in stocks." Recently, He has also promoted a crypto firm called LuckyFuture and has interacted on social media with Changpeng Zhao, the founder of the giant crypto exchange Binance. In a social media post, responding to an inquiry from the Times, Zhao said he learned about LuckyFuture after He reached out to him in the last few weeks. (A Binance spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.) He came to the United States from China about a decade ago to get a master's degree in finance at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, before returning to China and becoming active in the CPPCC, which is noted in his TechSharpe biography. This made He just the kind of student Trump is now targeting. But there was no hint of those kinds of fears in gracious invitations sent via email in mid-May to the dinner guests. "Congratulations!" said the notice sent to He, with a photo illustration of a muscular, smiling Trump at a dinner table, with an American flag on his lapel. "We can't wait to see you at the Gala Dinner." (He posted a copy of these emails on his social media account.) A table of foreign visitors According to a video taken at the dinner, the VIPs at just one table illustrated how many of the guests had traveled from overseas, including from China. He's dining companions included Justin Sun, a Chinese-born billionaire who was the contest's single largest buyer and one of the largest investors in the Trump family's other crypto venture, World Liberty Financial. Sun also has experience as a CPPCC member. In 2016, he was named as a delegate for a committee in a district in Guangzhou, a city in southern China. Only 26 at the time, he was among the youngest people in the country to sit on a CPPCC body. "I feel that the responsibility is very heavy, and I must strive to adapt to the new role as soon as possible," Sun was quoted in state media as saying at the time. (His representatives did not respond to a request for comment.) Also seated at the table were Cheng Lu, a Singapore-based crypto investor, who told the Times in an interview outside the White House that he bought a large amount of the family's meme coin because he wanted a chance to privately meet with Trump. Sheldon Xia, the founder of BitMart, a cryptocurrency trading platform backed by China-based Fenbushi Capital, joined them at the table, along with Sangrok Oh, the CEO of Hyperithm, a Seoul- and Tokyo-based firm that manages digital assets for institutional investors. Guests invited to the dinner were "required to fill out a brief form as part of the security background check to gain entry to the event," according to an email sent to the winners. The questionnaire was created with a service called CryptoComply offered by the New York-based firm Canaria Consulting. It requested information such as name, date of birth and place of residence. The 25 top Trump meme coin holders had their names submitted to a background check system called White House Worker and Visitor Entry System, a government official told the Times. This system compares the names of the pending visitors with government databases that include terrorist watch lists and lists of known criminals. "The U.S. Secret Service is responsible for vetting all White House visitors and guests, and we fully trust their process in doing so," Leavitt said. Some guests at the dinner said they were surprised at how lax the security appeared at the event. People not on the guest list were in certain cases allowed to enter the golf club grounds that evening and remain there after Trump arrived, the Times also confirmed. "I expected more from the security questions," said Nicholas Pinto, a Florida resident and crypto trader who attended the dinner. "It was very basic. And next thing you know, I am standing there in the room with President Trump."
Time of India
an hour ago
- Time of India
Trump ropes in Palantir to compile data on Americans
US President Donald Trump WASHINGTON: In March, President Donald Trump signed an executive order calling for the federal govt to share data across agencies, raising questions over whether he might compile a master list of personal information on Americans that could give him untold surveillance power. Trump has not publicly talked about the effort since. But behind the scenes, officials have quietly put technological building blocks into place to enable his plan. In particular, they have turned to one company: Palantir, the data analysis and technology firm. Representatives of Palantir are also speaking to at least two other agencies - the Social Security Administration and the Internal Revenue Service - about buying its technology. The push has put a key Palantir product called Foundry into at least four federal agencies, including DHS and the health and human services department. Widely adopting Foundry, which organizes and analyzes data, paves the way for Trump to easily merge information from different agencies, govt officials said. Creating detailed portraits of Americans based on govt data is not just a pipe dream. The Trump administration has already sought access to hundreds of data points on citizens and others through government databases, including their bank account numbers, the amount of their student debt, their medical claims and any disability status. Trump could potentially use such information to advance his political agenda by policing immigrants and punishing critics, Democratic lawmakers and critics have said. Privacy advocates, student unions and labour rights organizations have filed lawsuits to block data access, questioning whether the govt could weaponize people's personal information.
Hindustan Times
an hour ago
- Hindustan Times
US aerospace industry anxious as tariffs loom
US airlines and aerospace manufacturers insist they have no use for tariff protections, warning that the proposed Trump administration levies could eat into the healthy trade surplus the sector has enjoyed for more than 70 years. At the request of President Donald Trump, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick's department launched an investigation on May 1 to determine whether to impose tariffs of between 10 and 20 percent on civil aircraft and parts, including engines. The US industry those tariffs were crafted to protect swiftly let the administration know it was not interested. "Imposing broad tariff or non-tariff trade barriers on the imports of civil aviation technology would risk reversing decades of industrial progress and harm the domestic supply chain," the Aerospace Industries Association said in a letter addressed to Lutnick and obtained by AFP. The interested parties were given until June 3 to communicate their positions. The very next day, Lutnick announced that Washington aimed to "set the standard for aircraft part tariffs" by the end of this month. "The key is to protect that industry," he said, adding: "We will use these tariffs for the betterment of American industry." But AIA and the Airlines for America trade association voiced fear that far from helping, the tariffs would end up harming US manufacturers. "Unlike other industries, the civil aviation manufacturing industry prioritizes domestic production of high-value components and final assembly," AIA pointed out. According to the organization, US aerospace and defense exports reached $135.9 billion in 2023, including $113.9 billion for civil aviation alone. This allowed the sector to generate a trade surplus of $74.5 billion and to invest $34.5 billion in research and development, it said. The sector employs more than 2.2 million people in the United States across more than 100,000 companies, which in 2023 produced goods worth nearly $545 billion. In its response to Lutnick, the A4A highlighted how beneficial the international Agreement on Trade in Commercial Aviation had been by helping to eliminate tariffs and trade barriers over nearly half a century. "The US civil aviation industry is the success story that President Trump is looking for as it leads civil aerospace globally," it insisted. A full 84 percent of production was already American, it said, stressing that Washington "does not need to fix the 16 percent" remaining. "The current trade framework has enhanced our economic and national security and is a critical component to maintaining our national security moving forward," it said. For manufacturers, the potential tariffs would act like sand jamming a well-oiled machine that has been running smoothly for decades, experts warned. They would also throw off balance an ultra-sensitive supply chain still recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic. "To avoid the situation getting worse, we advocate to keep aerospace outside of trade wars," Willie Walsh, head of the International Air Transport Association , told the organization's general assembly last week. AIA meanwhile stressed that "aircraft and parts are already in high demand and have a limited supply." "Integrating new suppliers and expanding capacity is complex, timely, and costly," it warned, pointing out that finding suppliers capable of meeting rigorous safety certifications could "take up to 10 years." Delta Air Lines also argued for sticking with the status quo, cautioning that the proposed tariffs "would hinder Delta's ability to maintain its current trajectory." "If component parts incur tariffs upon entering the United States, Delta will be at a competitive disadvantage to foreign competitors," it said. "The action would also impose an unexpected tax on Delta's purchases of aircraft contracted years in advance." Delta chief Ed Bastian insisted in late April that the airline "will not be paying tariffs on any aircraft deliveries we take," adding that it was "working very closely with Airbus" to minimize the impact. Delta pointed out in its letter to Lutnick that it currently had 100 aircraft on order from Boeing, and that it was demanding that its Airbus A220s be produced primarily in Mobile, Alabama. But if the tariffs are imposed, it warned, "Delta would likely be forced to cancel existing contracts and reconsider contracts under negotiation." elm/tu/ph/nl/aha AIA Group Delta Air Lines Airbus Group BOEING
