Banking on China

Asia’s big markets aren’t growing. New ones are needed

LIQUEFIED natural gas exporters should look to a familiar place if they want to ride out the supply glut and a period of weaker-than-expected demand: China. And they should pin their hopes on Beijing to help their cause. Oversupply is about to get worse. The International Energy Agency (IEA) expects global LNG-export capacity will reach around 0.6 trillion cubic metres (0.54 trillion tonnes) by 2021, up from around 415bn cm last year. Around 90% of this will originate from the US and Australia and almost all will come from projects that have already been sanctioned. The IEA says that barring any significant supply disruptions markets will struggle to absorb the extra volumes. Demand in Japan