China managed to add a small volume of crude oil to inventories in July, as weak refinery processing outweighed a sharp drop in imports.

China's surplus crude for July amounted to 210,000 barrels per day (bpd) and came after the world's biggest oil importer drew ​on stockpiles in both May and June amid supply constraints caused by the Iran conflict.

The return to a surplus in China's crude availability in July ‌comes as a surprise given the huge decline in imports, with seaborne arrivals of oil down more than 3 million bpd from levels prior to the conflict.

(Continue Reading – RTRS)

States and their friends in the plaintiff bar are copying the campaign against Big Tobacco to raid Big Tech. This week a trial kicks off in federal court, where four states—California, Colorado, Kentucky and New Jersey—argue that Meta misled the public on the harms of social media to young minds. Nobody should be deceived into thinking these lawsuits will help children.

Meta now faces thousands of lawsuits in state and federal courts alleging that it fueled an epidemic of youth mental illness. There’s no question more young people are experiencing mental troubles, as smartphones and social media have become ubiquitous. But mass torts won’t solve this complex cultural problem.

(Continue Reading – WSJ)

When a super-secretive trading giant suddenly refinances billions of dollars of debt, people (at least those in finance) want to know why. Jane Street Group, the electronic market maker, has invited speculation by repaying its existing loans and bonds, and replacing them by selling nearly $15 billion of new bonds to a much smaller group of investors.

The initial suspicion was that Jane Street is shrinking the circle of trust of who gets to see details about its finances and performance. But news that the firm took heavy losses in last month’s stock-market selloff shows it needed to shore up its defenses, too. The more important aim of the swap was to protect itself against the threat of sharper spikes and falls in the value of its debt, which could hurt its access to other funding that backs its bets on markets.

(Continue Reading – BBG)