Xi Jinping Is Tired
Purple Ties On These Guys
The Wall Street Journal reported that Chinese officials made an unprecedented request to accommodate Xi Jinping’s need for rest during his recent summit with The Donald.
The man wanted a nap room.
He’s 73 years old.
He’s got a big job.
He just got off a 14-hour flight from Beijing.
And he was forced to hang out with this fucking guy for 72 hours.
I’d want a nap room too.
Why Is Xi Tired
(I actually can’t believe I am about to type the next few sentences.)
While the US under The Donald’s leadership continues to make unexpected political and military moves such as dismantling USAID, scaling back funding and involvement in the United Nations, condemning and threatening to leave NATO, casually espousing support for perpetrating war crimes, withdrawing from the World Health Organization, threatening genocide, regularly breaking international law, and starting an illegal war, China has stepped in to fill the void on the international stage that the Americans have walked away from.
Don’t get me wrong, Xi is no saint.
China’s human rights record is ugly.
Although it recently expanded its military presence in Southeast Asia and is currently conducting military exercises with Russia, China is not engaged in any active combat or at war with any other country anywhere in the world.
At the same time, in recent years, China, perhaps not entirely altruistically, has begun to address global concerns that the US is choosing to ignore.
They launched a global program with the United Nations, the Global Development Initiative, to help alleviate poverty, promote green energy development, and expand access to digital services.
At the 18th BRICS summit, the week before his US visit, Xi said that the war in Iran “does not serve the common interests of the international community”.
Xi signed a declaration along with the rest of the BRICS members at the summit that, among other issues, raised concerns regarding “unilateral tariff and non-tariff measures” that distort global trade, while also opposing sanctions imposed by unnamed countries (they were talking about the US) without United Nations Security Council (UNSC) authorization.
And he also suggested that BRICS countries should help steer the international order towards greater “equity and justice.”
Things that make you go, hmmm.
Xi’s Near-Term Policy: Leverage China’s Oil Reserves
ICYMI: Over the last decade, through a combination of production expansion and purchasing, China amassed the world’s largest oil stockpile.
Their oil industry has invested an estimated RMB 2.3 trillion (about US$343 billion) in domestic production since 2018.
The US Energy Information Administration estimates that China had nearly 1.4 billion barrels of strategic and commercial crude stocks combined at the end of 2025, including roughly 360 million barrels held by the government and about one billion held commercially.
China’s domestic output rose from roughly 3.8 million barrels a day to 4.3 million barrels a day over the last decade.
Then the war in Iran started.
In the second quarter of 2026, China’s net crude imports fell by 3.5 million barrels per day, or 30% from the previous year.
China’s Oil Imports Fell Off A Cliff Earlier This Year
Columbia University researchers estimate that more than half of that change came from China no longer replenishing its reserves and instead drawing oil from them.
China is importing less oil today than it did a decade ago.
This sharp decrease in China’s oil imports has been pivotal to keeping oil prices down for the rest of us.
Basically, China’s energy policy has helped curb global inflation and helped buoy the global economy.
Xi is making sure that you can still afford to buy things.
Things like new cars.
Xi’s Long Game: Eliminate Oil Demand
The Newly Updated BYD Seagull
Meanwhile, China is flooding the world with lower-cost electric vehicles.
As an example, the updated BYD Seagull starts at approximately $10,000 USD (69,900 yuan) in China and is projected or listed at roughly $20,000 to $25,000 CAD in Canada.
China’s passenger car exports in the first eight months of this year have already surpassed last year’s total, an industry association said Thursday, even as domestic sales continued to decline.
Once those cars are sold, charged, and on the road, replacing ICE vehicles, they could reduce oil demand by roughly 34,000 barrels a day, or about 2 billion litres a year.
That isn’t enough to curb the current (or impending) oil crisis.
But if China keeps exporting EVs at this pace, it will gradually remove drivers from the experience of gas-pump price dread and could displace around 9 million barrels of diesel and gasoline per day by 2035.
China has been working on a decades-long project to wean itself off its reliance on foreign oil.
And Xi is dragging us along for the ride.
Also, Don’t Destroy The Auto Industry While You’re Radically Disrupting the Auto Industry
At the end of August, China issued a series of guidelines for its automakers on how to behave in export markets, directing them to avoid aggressive pricing to gain an “improper advantage,” to comply with local laws, and to build better after-sales support.
Whoa!
According to the new guidelines, Chinese automakers operating outside of China “must not disrupt the order of market competition to obtain an improper competitive advantage”.
Basically, the message from Xi and Beijing was clear: don’t destroy the global automotive industry while we’re completely disrupting it.
IMHO
Yep, Xi is tired.
He’s probably taking more naps.
He’s having to maneuver around a weird, unpredictable, new world order that’s emerged under the influence of The Donald’s second presidency.
He’s exercising new political muscles in organizations such as the United Nations and the World Health Organization, while the US retreats from them.
He’s condemning wars, the negative impact of tariffs on global trade, and calling for more equity and justice at BRICS summits. (I’ll believe that when I see it.)
He’s balancing China’s leverage around the globe to keep people employed and able to afford Chinese goods while also shifting our driving behaviour from ICE to BEV and PHEV vehicles, redrawing the boundaries that define the world’s oil demand.
He’s expending his own country’s oil reserves in the process to help ensure you can still afford your new iPhone (built in iPhone City), your future Chinese-made electric vehicle, and all those other Chinese-made exports.
That’s gotta be exhausting.
I could use a nap myself.