OPEC’s output has been dropping for months, but mostly because Saudi Arabia has been taking on the role of swing producer and cutting its production in line with weaker demand. In March, it was other countries that saw their production decline, but it wasn’t demand-driven. You can read Platts’ numbers and analysis here.
Posts Tagged ‘Saudi Arabia’
OPEC oil output in March: a few countries struggled to keep up
By News Desk | April 10, 2013 03:47 PM Comments (0)
Regulation & The Environment: The growing Saudi thirst for crude oil
By News Desk | February 18, 2013 12:01 AM Comments (1)
The world’s biggest crude oil exporter has a problem: it is consuming too much of it at home. If current trends continue, it becomes a problem not just for the kingdom itself, but for the world as a whole. In this week’s Oilgram News column Regulation & The Environment, Kate Dourian reviews the country’s demand for oil and how it’s reacting to this growing drain on its exports.
OPEC’s January output: the Saudis cut again
By News Desk | February 7, 2013 04:35 PM Comments (0)
Saudi Arabia, for a second consecutive month, tried to act pretty much by itself and narrow the gap between projected supply and demand. As a result, overall OPEC production declined. A report on what happened last month can be found here.
China and the Saudis move the oil market imbalance closer
By John Kingston | January 17, 2013 03:20 PM Comments (0)
Some numbers in the global oil supply/demand balance have shifted fairly dramatically in just one month’s time, possibly putting an end to the big world inventory build.
You can look at numbers until you are cross-eyed. But if you’ve only got a minute to analyze, you look at what the International Energy Agency says is the call on OPEC crude, and you compare that to what OPEC actually is producing. The call is calculated by taking IEA’s estimate of global demand, subtracting its estimate of non-OPEC supply, subtracting its estimate of OPEC NGL production, and you have the call.
Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq vie for OPEC’s top job as Ecuador bows out
By Margaret McQuaile | December 7, 2012 02:52 PM Comments (0)
Ecuador has quietly withdrawn its candidacy for the post of OPEC secretary general, a decision apparently made some time back but not made public until December 4.
That leaves OPEC’s top three producers–Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran–fighting for the organization’s top administrative post on which ministers should, in theory, make a decision when they meet in Vienna on December 12 to agree oil output levels for the year ahead.
Cyber threats to energy security, as experienced by Saudi Arabia
By John Roberts | November 27, 2012 04:17 AM Comments (3)
Cyber assault is emerging as the principal concern for energy security. One oil major told me a few days ago: “We’re constantly under cyber attack.” But there is still a sense of denial hanging over the issue.
So while no less a figure than US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta can describe the al-Shamoon virus which assaulted Saudi Aramco and Qatar’s Rasgas in August as constituting probably the most destructive attack the business sector has yet sustained, Saudi Aramco itself has sought to downplay the impact. Read the rest of this entry »
How can OPEC agree output policy if it has trouble choosing a secretary general?
By Margaret McQuaile | October 24, 2012 10:03 AM Comments (2)
Appointing a secretary general to run OPEC’s Vienna headquarters should be easy. It never is. The job is technically an administrative one, but political rivalries between key producers have overshadowed the appointment process for years.
We’re talking primarily about OPEC kingpin Saudi Arabia and Iran, but with Iraq now having overtaken Iran to become the oil cartel’s second biggest producer, Baghdad may well turn more assertive about its right to the post in the future.
Mixed IEA oil report gives scant support for SPR talk
By Robert Perkins | September 12, 2012 02:31 PM Comments (0)
The International Energy Agency painted a mixed picture of the current global oil market with its latest monthly report September 12, suggesting an adequate cushion of stocks and supply as geopolitical clouds over Iran’s oil continue to circle.
In a report which made few changes to its closely-watched global oil demand forecasts, the IEA’s estimates for OECD stock levels managed to be both bullish and potentially bearish.
Petrodollars: The burdens of being Saudi Arabia’s state oil company
By News Desk | August 27, 2012 10:29 PM Comments (1)
Saudi Aramco is a big company. But the question in Saudia Arabia is whether it’s being called upon to do too much in the kingdom. Kate Dourian, in this week’s Petrodollars column from Oilgram News, discusses the dilemma.
Iraq overtakes Iran as OPEC number 2 oil producer behind Saudi Arabia
By Margaret McQuaile | August 13, 2012 08:50 AM Comments (0)
Many in the oil industry will remember well the mantra of Iran’s delegation to OPEC in the 1980s: that Iran’s OPEC quota should always be double that of Iraq. They will also remember the late 1988 OPEC meeting at which Tehran accepted quota parity for Iraq.
That was just 20 months before Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, at which point the notion of parity flew out of the window. Under UN sanctions, Iraq exported no oil for several years. Exports finally resumed in 1997 under the oil-for-food agreement with the UN, but production capacity remained stifled.