Bloomberg Santos Ltd. agreed to buy ConocoPhillips’ northern Australia business for $1.4 billion in a deal that will boost the Adelaide-based oil and gas producer’s position in the growing Asian liquefied natural gas market. The transaction may allow Santos to become the country’s largest independent energy producer and capitalise on a push by Asian consumers, including China, to switch to …

Bloomberg China’s biggest refiner plans to reduce operations from next month after a surge in the cost of shipping crude eroded margins. Freight rates have skyrocketed since the US announced sanctions on Chinese shipowners in late-September, triggering a flight from vessels owned by affected companies and a bidding war for alternative tankers. That’s driven up the cost of importing crude …

Bloomberg Hold on to your smartphone — the holiday price wars between Walmart Inc and Amazon.com Inc are heating up. Walmart, the world’s largest retailer, has introduced a programme to temporarily lower the price consumers pay for some items on its marketplace site, where third-party vendors pay Walmart a fee to list their goods. The merchants selling on the site, …