The 5-percent tariffs China imposed on U.S. crude oil imports two months ago could challenge the growth prospects of overall exports, economists gathered for an industry event have warned. “China’s the big growth in demand. The whole focus of U.S. exports will eventually somehow have to get back to China,” said the chief economist of Phillips 66, Horace Hobbs, as quoted by S&P Global Platts, during the US Association for Energy Economics conference. Talk about Chinese tariffs on U.S. oil imports began pretty much as soon as the conflict began. Even the anticipation of tariffs made a lot of Chinese refiners stop buying U.S. crude as they waited to see how the situation would develop. For three months last year, China imported zero barrels of U.S. oil, and it did the same in January. Since then, imports have been restarted, and over the first nine months of this year, […]