He’s an idiot.
The world’s oil prices are not being held “hostage” by Opec. Oil prices are being driven by the world’s massive expansion of the use of automobiles - particularly in Asia, the Fed’s cheap dollar policies, and hedge funds and other institutional investors placing bets that the first two factors will continue for some time. Opec and all oil exporting countries may benefit from those conditions, but they have not created them.
China’s trade imbalance with the U.S. is another feature of the Fed’s money printing machines; making it possible for the American economy to spend more than it is producing, which usually trends to excess consumption spending, which benefits cheap imports.
Reverse course at the Fed, raise interest rates and quit printing excess dollars and both imports and world commodity prices will come down.
That’s not to say that the Chinese currency is NOT undervalued. It most likely is. But, even if that fact was changed, the Fed’s policies would still have American’s borrowing and spending too much on consumption, saving and investing too little; which would still favor imports.
Why have oil and gas prices gone up about 20% over the last two months?