The Russian leader arrives in China days after Trump in search of an energy deal, with yuan settlements, pricing potentially on the table
6-MIN READ6-MINJi Siqiin BeijingPublished: 6:00am, 20 May 2026Last week, US President Donald Trump landed in China aiming to secure the kind of blockbuster trade deals he championed nine years ago – spanning everything from soybeans to aircraft and energy.
Russia’s goal for any negotiations is simple: shore up its domestic economy by selling more oil and gas to China. But Beijing has other considerations – from avoiding overreliance on a single energy supplier, to reducing its dependence on the US dollar by settling transactions in yuan.
What’s more, there are practical obstacles to ramping up Russian energy flows, including the looming return of US sanctions and the threat of Ukrainian drone attacks. The question is: can Putin overcome all these barriers and secure the kind of deal he wants from China, Russia’s largest energy buyer?
