As global oil prices tumble, Saudi officials are considering plans to sell shares in state-owned entities and companies, according to two people with knowledge of the discussions, in an attempt to find alternative sources of revenue.
The government may sell stakes in ports, railways, utilities and airports, the two people said. Hospitals may also be privatized, one person said. Saudi officials weren’t immediately available for comment.
With oil prices down to an 11-year low, Saudi officials are accelerating efforts to reduce the economy’s reliance on revenue from crude exports. They may have missed their best chance when prices were higher, according to economists and an International Monetary Fund study that highlighted how successful attempts depended on policies put in place before the slump.
An end to the U.S.’s 40-year ban on oil exports is probably not what OPEC needs right now. Yet a resurgent Iran may present a greater threat as it prepares to dump a million barrels on the market next year.
Oil expert Professor Alex Kemp has said there is some cause for optimism that the oil price may rally in 2017, but not before it endured a "painful" 2016.
Investors around the world have seen $240 billion wiped off the value of oil companies in the week since OPEC sent crude prices plunging to a seven-year low by abandoning its output limit.
Oil declined to the lowest level since 2008 in London amid estimates that OPEC’s decision to scrap production limits will keep the market oversupplied.
OPEC raised crude output to the highest in more than three years as it pressed on with a strategy to protect market share and pressure competing producers.
Oil traded near the lowest close in more than six years as speculation OPEC will keep markets oversupplied countered a drop in US crude stockpiles.
Futures slipped 0.5 percent in New York after closing 9.5 percent lower in the four days since OPEC’s Dec. 4 decision to effectively abandon its output target. The exporters’ group raised production in November to a three-year high, according to its monthly report.
US stockpiles along the Gulf Coast fell the most since December 2012, according to government data Wednesday. Refiners typically drain tanks to reduce their tax burden, which is determined by year-end levels.
OPEC has seemingly dropped any attempt at trying to fulfill its founding mission and manage the oil market, sending global benchmark Brent crude to a six-year low. For Saudi Arabia’s Ali al-Naimi, the most powerful and longest- serving of the group’s oil ministers, it may have seemed like history was repeating itself.
Friday’s OPEC meeting in Vienna confirmed what the global oil and gas industry was already resigned to – no curb to production, the supply overhang extending and more pain for the upstream industry as a whole.
On Friday, OPEC concluded its 168th Meeting of the Oil Production and Exporting Countries Conference, with members agreeing to effectively abandon the 30 million barrel per day (mmbbl/d) production limit which has been in place since 2011.
Brent crude, the international standard benchmark, fell some 3.23% on Monday to the lowest front month futures price since late 2008.
Oil extended losses below $40 a barrel amid speculation a record global glut will be prolonged as OPEC abandoned its long-time strategy of limiting production to control prices.
Iran joined Saudi Arabia in saying it would keep on pumping despite oil prices hovering near a six-year low, giving the strongest signal yet that OPEC wouldn’t act at the group’s meeting in Vienna to curb the global supply glut.
OPEC's widely anticipated decision not to cut production could have far reaching consequences for the global oil markets - and the North Sea oil industry - according to experts at KPMG.
Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest crude exporter, may propose an eventual OPEC production cut of 1 million barrels of oil a day that may take affect in 2016, Energy Intelligence reported Thursday, citing a group delegate it didn’t identify.
The majority of OPEC members would agree to a reduction in crude production at Friday’s meeting, with the exception of Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf Arab countries, Shana reported, citing Mehdi Asali, director general of OPEC and energy forums at the Iranian Ministry of Petroleum.
Russian oil output in November hovered near a post-Soviet record set the previous month, shrugging off a crude-price slump before OPEC gathers for its biannual meeting in Vienna.
Saudi Arabia will discuss all issues at the OPEC meeting on Friday and listen to concerns of other members, said the nation’s Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi.
Oil headed for its largest monthly drop since July as Iran signaled the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries won’t reduce its production target at a meeting this week.
