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Regarding claims Iran is still shipping energy to China...

China needs energy from the entire Middle East, not just Iran, and even if Saudi Arabia and others have alternative routes for Chinese-bound energy exports it will still be far less than they've been receiving before the conflict.

And as the conflict continues there are greater chances even these alternatives will be targeted in one way or another - already the US is targeting Iranian energy production itself and is shaping narratives to justify the full interdiction of any energy exports from the region before they reach China.

Notice how the US doesn't really seem to have a coherent/obtainable public objective regarding Iran.

Is that because they don't have one at all?

Or because their actual objective can't be said out loud (destroying the global economy hoping to kill off China while only weakening the US in the process)?

A GRAND BARGAIN?

Regarding claims that all of this will lead to a "grand bargain" with China to sell US energy to it directly - the whole point of the US invading Venezuela, attacking Iran, strangling China technologically for years is to strangle China completely.

Selling energy to China will allow China to continue its already astronomical drive toward energy independence by 2030 and would still result in China's irreversible surpassing of the US - something the US has openly tried to prevent since the end of WW2.

Even with a US-imposed blockade in place, China is still likely to achieve energy independence in 5-10 years albeit at much greater cost - at which point the US will have lost its remaining leverage over China.

Also, unless purveyors of this theory suggest the US will control entirely all energy produced by Venezuela, Iran, AND the Persian Gulf states - the US itself has no possible way of providing China the total physical quantities of energy it needs as part of any "grand bargain."

China's potential purchasing of US energy would simply be a short-term strategic bridge toward energy independence it is already pursuing - a bridge that would make little sense for the US to provide to it as part of some sort of genuine "bargain."

A similar example is the US cutting chips off to China - hoping to strangle China's technological development.

The US has since offered inferior chips as an alternative in the hopes of slowing down China's drive toward chip independence.

Not only did China refuse because it knows this isn't a compromise but rather a trap - even if it accepted the offer it would have unlikely slowed down China's attempts toward chip independence since it knows the US will never accept coexistence.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEGKl8JWG4I