{"id":6600,"date":"2015-03-18T07:08:19","date_gmt":"2015-03-18T12:08:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=6600"},"modified":"2015-03-18T07:08:19","modified_gmt":"2015-03-18T12:08:19","slug":"saudis-claim-conspiracy-theorists-not-opec-to-blame-for-oil-price-crash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=6600","title":{"rendered":"Saudis Claim Conspiracy Theorists, Not OPEC, To Blame For Oil Price Crash"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3><a href=\"http:\/\/oilprice.com\/Energy\/Oil-Prices\/Conspiracy-Theorists-Not-OPEC-To-Blame-For-Oil-Price-Crash.html\" target=\"_blank\">Saudis Claim Conspiracy Theorists, Not OPEC, To Blame For Oil Price Crash<\/a><\/h3>\n<p>A top Saudi official said on March 15 that Thomas Friedman and other conspiracy theorists are to blame for the crash in oil prices.<\/p>\n<p>Rather than an oversupply and weak demand causing an imbalance in global oil markets, Dr. Ibrahim Al-Muhanna, the advisor to Saudi Arabia\u2019s Petroleum Minister, said that excessive speculation drove the oil bust.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe recent price fall was due largely to expectation and perception about future supply and demand&#8230; and the ever-present \u2013 and incorrect \u2013 belief in conspiracy theories,\u201d Al-Muhanna\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/news\/2015-03-16\/what-saudi-arabia-told-bank-england-about-why-oil-crashed-and-where-it-headed-next\">said<\/a>\u00a0at the Institute of International Finance\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.iif.com\/events\/2015-iif-global-membership-meeting\/agenda\">Spring Membership Meeting<\/a>\u00a0on March 15.<\/p>\n<p>Al-Muhanna admitted that supplies were building over the course of 2014, but said that demand \u201cremained strong\u201d and that the price fall was unjustified given market fundamentals. After prices started to fall, the media and market analysts drove the narrative to unfounded levels.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Related:<\/strong>\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/oilprice.com\/Energy\/Oil-Prices\/Misleading-IEA-Statement-Sends-Oil-Prices-Crashing.html\">Misleading IEA Statement Sends Oil Prices Crashing<\/a><\/p>\n<p>In fact, Al-Muhanna said, in October 2014 when Saudi Arabia adjusted its price for oil heading for Asia \u2013 a conventional practice that occurs every month \u2013 western media began talking up Saudi Arabia\u2019s \u201cprice war,\u201d and he even singled out New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman. \u201cThen an article by Thomas Friedman suggested Saudi Arabia\u2019s policy \u2013 in coordination with the Obama administration \u2013 was aimed at hurting Russia by lowering the oil price. This idea was a rehash of assumptions that first reasoned the oil fall of the 1980s. All complete fantasy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Saudis Claim Conspiracy Theorists, Not OPEC, To Blame For Oil Price Crash A top Saudi official said on March 15 that Thomas Friedman and other conspiracy theorists are to blame for the crash in oil prices. Rather than an oversupply and weak demand causing an imbalance in global oil markets, Dr. Ibrahim Al-Muhanna, the advisor [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[159,2370,1775,600,4252,4251,1427,1143,4253],"class_list":["post-6600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","tag-conspiracy-theories","tag-conspiracy-theory","tag-oil-price-collapse","tag-opec","tag-oversupply","tag-saudis","tag-supply-and-demand","tag-thomas-friedman","tag-weak-demand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6600"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6600\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6601,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6600\/revisions\/6601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}