Via Bloomberg:

China entered into an oil-for-loans accord with Brazil yesterday — its third such deal in three days — tapping the nation’s $1.95 trillion foreign-exchange reserves at a time when credit is scarce. In all, the world’s second-largest oil user will get about 600,000 barrels a day, equal to 17 percent of its imports last year, in return for providing $39 billion of loans….

• China agreed on Feb. 17 to provide Russia with $25 billion of loans in return for 300,000 barrels a day of oil for 20 years.
• Venezuela’s Petroleos de Venezuela, known as PDVSA, will provide 200,000 barrels a day to the Asian country to pay down a $4 billion loan from China Development Bank. Venezuela’s oil is “at the service of China,” President Hugo Chavez said Feb. 18.
• Chinese President Hu Jintao visited Saudi Arabia Feb. 10-12. A deal between China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., Asia’s biggest oil processor, and Saudi Aramco is expected.
• Chinalco, the Aluminum Corporation of China, plans to invest $30 billion into Australian mining giant Rio Tinto to back up its initial $11 billion stake made in 2007. Rio Tinto is three times the size of Chinalco.
• China Minmetals placed and the $2.6 billion bid for troubled Australian mining company OZ Minerals. “If China wasn’t there, I don’t know where we would be … what’s the alternative?” said OZ Minerals chief executive Andrew Michelmore.
• In Feburary 2007, Chinalco bought Peru’s Mount Tomorocho, the world’s most productive copper mine.

The history of the future is being written here.