Resolves YES if Saudi Arabia officials agree to price oil sales to China in yuan before 2024 and at least 1 million tonnes of crude oil is shipped in 2023, or contracted this year to ship in the future, in this denomination to China. Sources for verification will include official statements and mainstream news reports.

Resolves NO otherwise.

The “1 million tonnes” threshold is set to indicate whether an agreement is mostly cheap talk or is a significant share of trade in fact going to be denominated in yuans. For reference, “Saudi Arabia shipped a total of 87.49 million tonnes of crude to China in 2022, equivalent to 1.75 million bpd, customs data showed, on par with the level in 2021.” (Reuters)

Context: All-in podcast, E110, “2023 Bestie Predictions!”

David Sacks: “My biggest political winner for 2023 is MBS Mohammed bin Salman. I think that Saudi Arabia will have the most important year in kind of the modern era in terms of their role. I don't know if you guys saw this Reuters report from a few weeks ago but there's kind of a deepening discussion about the oil Yuan trade in that Saudi would sell oil to China and they would get paid in Yuan. (…) I think that ultimately the direction of where global currency kind of reserves will be taken and the importance of these great nations and who sits atop whom can actually be dictated and significantly influenced by MBS this year by some of the deals and trades he might put in place and the kind of partnerships he might forge. (…) China and Russia have open arms. And all they want is for Saudi to start doing trades in Yuan, it's going to happen. (…)”

David Friedberg: “[Prediction for the biggest business deal of 2023.] The Petro Yuan trade, I think that's the Saudi China trade, if this happens, and oil is sold in Yuan, it marks the beginning of, I think, the end of the assumption that the US dollar is the global reserve and the risk free currency in reserve for the world.”