Saudi Arabia recently changed its tune in regards to world oil prices. And President Trump is largely to thank. Under pressure from Trump, the Saudi government decided it would be in its best interest to keep oil prices reasonably low.
According to Bloomberg:
The world’s largest oil exporter just made quite a policy swerve. Within six weeks, Saudi Arabia has gone from advocating higher prices to trying to stop the rally at $80 a barrel.
The U-turn scrambled the outlook for oil markets, hit the share prices of oil majors and shale producers and set up a diplomatic wrangle with other members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.
What changed? The supply threats posed by the re-imposition of U.S. sanctions on Iran oil exports earlier this month and the quickening collapse of Venezuela’s energy industry are both part of the answer, but they’re secondary to Donald Trump. On April 20, the president took to Twitter to lambaste the cartel’s push for higher prices. “Looks like OPEC is at it again,” he tweeted. “Oil prices are artificially Very High!”
Trump’s intervention gave typically strident voice to a concern held more widely in the U.S. and other consuming countries: oil’s rally from less than $30 in early 2016 to more than $80 this month risked becoming a threat to global economic growth.
This is just another win for the American people from the Trump Administration. The mainstream media will largely ignore this to talk about some scandal they dreamed up, but this is a huge win for America.