Saudi Arabia, until recently the world’s top oil exporter and still de facto OPEC leader, is feeling pressure. Its top exporting customer of nearly four decades, the US, has become its greatest competitor. Amid the shale oil boom and the wonders of hydraulic fracturing (fracking), the US is now producing over 9 million barrels of crude… Keep reading →
Fatih Birol, the Executive Director of the IEA, said at a recent conference that the US will not become the “next Saudi Arabia”, despite its position among the world’s top oil producers. “US oil production increased significantly and is due to continue to increase. This is excellent news for the United States and world oil… Keep reading →
Prior to Apple taking the developed world with its innovative products by storm and critically shaping the digital age as we now know it, computer users often used to defrag(ment) their hard drives manually. Basically, the process of ‘defragmentation’ meant to reduce the amount of fragmentation within a system for maintenance purposes “by physically organizing… Keep reading →
What time is it? Credit: Shutterstock Many analysts agree that as US oil companies pullback capital spending, lay down rigs and drill fewer new wells, production will inevitably decline, supply and demand fundamentals will rebalance and oil prices will increase. But that’s where the agreement ends. International benchmark crude oil prices have recovered a bit… Keep reading →
With the global oil market currently oversupplied to the tune of an estimated 2 million barrels per day, oil producer group Opec has struggled to formulate an effective strategy aside from “let the market sort it out.” For decades Opec played a price-setting role by increasing production to boost supply when prices were deemed too… Keep reading →
Times are changing and Opec is not what it once was in terms of oil price influence, but it’s too soon to completely dismiss the producer group that collectively controls such a large share of the world’s oil production, reserves, exports and thus supply. In this article, a Saudi diplomat argues his country “gets… Keep reading →
Russian officials already in the unenviable position of dealing with the impact of Western sanctions on their national economy as reflected in a tumbling ruble – in spite of continuous Central Bank interventions – and capital outflows, now face the possibility of a recession looming in 2015, according to recent World Bank projections. Russia: Policy Uncertainty… Keep reading →
Oil market observers will take a break from their Turkey preparations this Thursday to see whether Opec producers decide to cut oil output in a bid to stabilize prices. The meeting being held in Vienna will be long over by the time folks in the US sit down to Thanksgiving dinner. But there is no… Keep reading →
This article reevaluates Opec’s power to control the global oil market and focuses on a political scientist’s research that suggests the cartel’s strength has been overblown for years. “But a closer look at OPEC’s real influence over the oil market suggests that we’re making a huge mistake about its global power, says Brown University political… Keep reading →
Opinion: Approving Energy Exports Would Unlock Huge Economic Growth
By Margo ThorningThe Department of Energy recently approved an application from Alaska LNG to export natural gas. But there’s a catch: these exports can only go to nations where the United States has a free-trade agreement in place. Never mind the fact that the top markets for LNG are India, China, and Japan, where we don’t have… Keep reading →