Saudi Arabia has moved away from the strategy of increasing sales of oil to the Asian markets and gradually gives way to a share of world trade to their competitors in the hope of a price recovery. On Thursday, 30 June, writes Reuters, citing its own research.
Experts point to signs that the pursuit of market dominance is no longer the main priority for the Kingdom, especially when it comes to Asia. “The figures provided by the main Asian buyers — China, India, Japan, South Korea — say that Saudi Arabia is inferior to their share to Iran and Iraq, and also Russia, which increases the pressure”, — the newspaper writes.
This process is difficult to call voluntary, but the impression that state Saudi Aramco is doing nothing to stop the loss of positions, analysts said. “Over the last few months Aramco raised the official price to Asia for its Arab Light oil sales which account for about two-thirds of the total oil exports of the Kingdom”, the study says.
On 28 June, customs data China showed that Russia in January-may of 2016, took first place for the supply of oil to China, overtaking Saudi Arabia.
June 21, Reuters reported that oil exports from Saudi Arabia in April fell to the lowest since October last year. The volume of oil production in the country remained at a record high.
June 2, representatives of States, members of OPEC, including Saudi Arabia, again failed to agree on limiting crude oil production. According to media reports, the decision on the freezing of fuel production was blocked by the representative of Iran.
