China’s May Holiday Air Travel Could Stem Oil Price Drop

(Bloomberg) — Global oil traders are fixated on the next milestone in China’s economic recovery — when travelers pack their bags and head to the airport for the upcoming May Day holiday.

Some 170 million Chinese holidayed abroad in 2019, before the pandemic struck. That figure sank to less than 9 million last year at the height of China’s lockdowns. The likelihood of dramatically more air travel explains why jet fuel consumption in China is widely seen as the single biggest driver of world oil demand growth this year, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co.