BlackMask Breaking News

United States President Donald Trump confirmed on Monday that he spoke with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, amid diplomatic efforts to resolve the Ukrainian conflict. The US president did not share further details about his conversation with Putin, but reiterated that the latter leader also wants the war to end. At the same time, Trump remained optimistic about the progress made in negotiations between the US, Ukraine, and European countries that concluded in Berlin earlier today.

Kremlin denies Trump had phone call with Putin

The European Union on Monday slapped sanctions on nine entities and individuals for supporting Russia’s shadow fleet moving oil, as the bloc seeks to further restrict Moscow’s ability to generate revenues from energy exports.    The Council of the EU sanctioned five individuals and four entities responsible for supporting Russia’s shadow fleet and its value chain.     The designated individuals are businessmen directly or indirectly linked to Rosneft and Lukoil, which were sanctioned by the United States in October as the White House sought to force the Kremlin to sit down for talks on ending the war in Ukraine.  The individuals sanctioned by the EU today are all involved in an economic sector providing a substantial source of revenue to Russia’s government, the EU said. They also “control vessels transporting crude oil or petroleum products, originating in Russia or being exported from Russia, concealing the actual origin of the oil, while practicing irregular and high-risk shipping practices,” the bloc noted in a press statement.  The sanctioned individuals are Murtaza Lakhani, a Canadian-Pakistani oil trader, Valery Kildiyarov, finance director of Lukoil’s Litasco Middle East DMCC, and Anar Madatli, Talat Safarov, and Etibar Eyyub—shareholders and/or directors of 2Rivers Group, a UAE based oil-trading company previously known as Coral Energy. The four entities included in the new sanctions are all shipping companies based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Vietnam, and Russia. These firms either own or manage tankers blacklisted by the EU or by other countries for being part of Russia’s shadow fleet.  UAE-based Nova Shipmanagement LLC-FZ and Citrine Marine SPC, Vietnam-registered Hung Phat Maritime Trading, and Russia-based SeverTransBunker Company Limited are the companies designated by the EU today.  The fresh EU sanctions come amid still chaotic trade with Russian crude after the U.S. sanctions on Rosneft and Lukoil upended the buying plans and patterns of most Indian refiners. Meanwhile, falling oil prices and strengthening Russian currency are set to slash Russia’s oil and gas revenues by nearly 50% in December from a year earlier, to the lowest level since August 2020, according to Reuters calculations.

NN: See special report titled: The Shadow Knows in BlackMask Market News and Commentary.

Another foreign tanker was seized by Iran in the Gulf of Oman, Iranian state media IRIB reported Friday. The vessel was allegedly carrying 6 million liters of “smuggled diesel.” While no details on the origin of the vessel and its cargo have been disclosed so far, the move follows the United States’ interception of an oil tanker off the Venezuelan coast yesterday that added more friction to the already-strained relationship between Washington and Caracas.

NN: This is a story that could blow up Mutual Fund traders oil shorts. All that want for Christmas is oil on its lows, In January they don’t care because year end bonuses are paid on the oil trade to the end of December

• Seizure aims to target shadow tanker fleet selling oil to China, other nations
• Venezuelan government calls US actions ‘piracy’; experts argue legality under international law
• Shipments totalling nearly 6 million barrels of crude suspended after seizure, source says

The United States plans to seize more tankers carrying Venezuelan crude, Reuters reported today, citing unnamed sources who said there was already a list of vessels targeted for seizure. Earlier in the week, the move by U.S. federal government forces to seize the Panama-flagged tanker Skipper off the Venezuelan coast prompted a jump in oil prices as it signaled possible disruption of oil flows out of Venezuela. The news of plans for more seizures may extend the rally even though prices dipped on Thursday in a counterintuitive reaction to the original seizure. According to reports, there are some 30 tankers under U.S. sanctions that transport Venezuelan crude to international clients. These may be forced to remain in port to avoid seizure, which would result in the abovementioned disruption. Shrugging this risk off, traders are selling oil, which has put Brent crude and West Texas Intermediate on track for a weekly decline.

“We’re not going to stand by and watch sanctioned vessels sail the seas with black market oil, the proceeds of which will fuel narcoterrorism of rogue and illegitimate regimes around the world,” White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told media on Thursday in response to questions about future seizures.

Meanwhile, the U.S. government targeted other parts of the Venezuelan oil industry this week, with the Treasury Department imposing sanctions on Maduro family members, a longtime business ally, and six companies operating tankers that have kept PDVSA’s exports alive through opaque shipping practices. The freshly sanctioned tankers are flagged in the Marshall Islands, Panama, or the Cook Islands and were blacklisted for moving Venezuelan crude while using deceptive AIS practices to mask their routes. Several of the tankers, including the White Crane and Kiara M, loaded barrels as recently as October and are now frozen out of the U.S. financial system.

NN: This is a wild turn of events. This  will take hughe amount of oil out of the markets. No only the named tanker for seizer. But the shadow fleet has to stay in friendly ports not risking losing their ships and cargoes on the high seas

United States President Donald Trump reaffirmed that the US “would help with security” if Russia and Ukraine reach a peace agreement, saying he considers it a “necessary factor in getting it done.” “I thought we were close with Russia to having a deal, I thought we were close with Ukraine to having a deal. In fact, other than [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelensky, his people loved the concept of the deal,” Trump said. “There’s a meeting on Saturday and we’ll see whether or not we attend the meeting…We’ll be attending the meeting on Saturday in Europe if we think there’s a good chance” of making progress, Trump noted.

Ushakov: All of Donbass is Russian

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s Assistant for Foreign Policy, Yuri Ushakov (pictured), stated on Friday that the entire Donbass is Russian territory under the Russian Constitution in response to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s proposal for a territorial referendum. “Donbass is Russian. All of it. There is a Constitution,” Ushakov told the press while speculating that Zelensky could be floating an election to “force a ceasefire.” As pressure mounts on Kiev to accept the conditions of a developing US peace plan, the Ukrainian president raised the possibility of letting Ukrainians vote on whether to give the Donbas territory to Russia.

NN: Its a trick. If Ukraine gives up Donbas in 6 months the entire country will be in Russian hands. If they fight on their is a good chance with European financial support and shutting down Russian oil export money machine they can be stopped

 

The US administration is seeking to adopt a more central role in implementing anti-money laundering regulations, The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, citing a draft seen by the media outlet. According to the report, the current system gives regulators some access and prominence. However, they aim to have a more active role in efforts to revamp a system designed to catch illicit transactions by drug traffickers, terrorists, and other criminals. Issues in this front have been costly and ineffective. Former bank controllers and officials have long pressed for changes like this, criticizing existing regulations for focusing too much on technicalities and compliance without providing effective measures to address these problems. The Trump administration, along with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, believes that restrictions on banks have hindered economic growth.

NN: This is dangerous. Moving closer by the day to a cashless society. You know the US government has never confiscated guns. But they did make gold ownership and trading illegal. And they did confiscate gold and put gold hoarders in jail.

Behind the façade of calm oil markets, a gradual build-up in speculative positions could be undermining future prices of Brent or WTI as both benchmarks remain on their longest runs below their 100-day moving average in more than a year.  Open interest held in ICE Brent is now the highest in history – 5.5 million contracts as of this week – however investors hold more Dec 2026 contracts than any other month except for the prompt two, February and March, suggesting that the market wants to hedge itself against oversupply next year. Hedge funds have been raising their short positions on crude for the past two months, with ICE Brent now

posting the highest outright number of shorts on record (174,703 contracts in the week ending December 2).

Oil prices continue to search for direction as a supply scare from Iraq turned out to be short-lived, with most market speculation centred around Ukraine peace talks and US Federal Reserve policy. With ICE Brent still hovering around $63 per barrel, the Fed’s last gathering in 2025 could provide some temporary upside to prices, however it is unlikely to fundamentally break the current stalemate.

NN: You well know my cut in stone basic rule of trading:

When everyone else is selling i Buy and when everyone is buying i sell.

Well they sure as shit are buying.

United States President Donald Trump did not want to rule out the possibility of deploying ground forces to Venezuela in his interview with Politico on Tuesday. “I don’t want to talk to you about military strategy,” the US president said. At the same time, he reiterated his willingness to use force in Central and South America to fight drug smuggling. Tensions between the US and Venezuela have been on the rise in recent times, as Washington continued to amass military assets in the region, hinting at a possible military operation against the regime of the country’s President Nicolas Maduro

NN:  Trump is going in and Maduro will be going out in a body bag

United States President Donald Trump’s former Senior Counselor and Chief Strategist Steve Bannon said on Monday that Trump’s peace plan for Ukraine will not stop the war because the US doesn’t have the “capacity” to execute it. In an interview with The American Conservative, Bannon claimed that “America First [broke] the globalist mindset that we have the capacity to financially, economically, militarily, culturally govern everywhere and everything,” he said, describing both the Ukraine and the Gaza ceasefire plans as “side shows to our vital national security interests.” Furthermore, Bannon called for a total cessation of aid to Ukraine. “[We] need to cut it off. All of it. Money. Arms. Intelligence. Support,” he stressed.

NN: Bannon has taken those free stupid pills they are handing out. Lose Ukraine to Russia and Europe will not be far behind.

Orban: EU is preparing for war with Russia by 2030

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban warned on Monday that the European Union is “preparing for war” with Russia and that the bloc already designated 2030 as its target date for the start of that “war.” “The explicit goal of the rearmament program launched by Brussels is for the Union to be ready for war by 2030. The target date for Ukraine’s accelerated EU accession procedure is also 2030. And the EU’s founding treaty states that ‘in the event of an armed attack against the territory of one of the member states, the other member states are obliged to provide all assistance in their power to that state.’ Therefore, admitting Ukraine, which is at war, into the Union would result in an immediate entry into the war,” Orban said in a post on Facebook.The Hungarian prime minister also stated that next year’s Hungarian election will be the last one where “we can truly decide on the issue of war and peace.”