Quote from: jaysabi on December 23, 2014, 03:57:43 PM

Quote from: NewLiberty on December 17, 2014, 08:35:22 AM

Quote from: jaysabi on December 16, 2014, 09:56:34 PM

Mate, I'm not saying they're "set" at all. It's a function of supply and demand. I'm referencing the financial trade papers on the topic, like WSJ or Bloomberg who report that there's an oversupply of oil brought on by the shale production in the US. (US oil production has doubled since 2008 due to fracking.) Traditionally, when there is an oversupply, OPEC cuts back to keep the price elevated, and although most of the OPEC members want to cut back, Saudi Arabia (the largest oil producer in the world) has announced they will not be cutting production due to price declines. This has caused the price of oil to drop to the lowest point in 5 years because it means the oversupply is not going to be addressed. Saudi Arabia is doing this intentionally because shale oil is expensive to produce, and the state-run Saudi oil companies can stomach losses longer than American firms, who have to answer to shareholders who have no will to absorb losses for a sustained period of time. As an added bonus, low oil prices hurt Iran, a regional rival politically and militarily.

Here's an article published a few days ago about the oil blinking contest between the US and Saudi Arabia:
(article can be found in jaysabi post above)

The Article only shows that others have also speculated on the intent of others.

We agree on the consequences of the action (non-action) which this author quotes someone saying is "a declaration of war". Accusing the head of Saudi Arabia of declaring war by doing exactly nothing seems a bit extreme to me, but maybe I am alone in that?

I think you missed my point entirely, since all you did was aggravate it with an escalation of the violation rather than suggest that my point was not correct.

To be more clear:
You do not know the mind of another person without them telling you. Therefore claiming intention, rather than consequence, is unduly invidious.
If you brought forth a quote of someone in charge of the decision saying why they were doing it, that would be one thing. Instead you brought forward a (worse) example of someone else doing this transgression of invidiously assuming the intention without evidence of that intention.

Nor do you know the mind of another person even with them telling you either. Governments lie about their intentions and their actions all the time. It's true no one from Saudi Arabia has said this is what they're doing, and I'd be pretty surprised if they did since they're wholly dependent on the US militarily. The Kingdom is also dependent on high oil prices, since it is basically the country's only source of income. In seeing the consequences of what they're doing, I'm making an educated guess as to the intention. But I'll even walk it back and say it's likely not the primary driver of their actions, but the fact that prolonged low oil prices hurt shale producers and increases their future market share certainly does not go unnoticed by them, and they view it as a long term benefit. To say that it was the primary objective of their actions was overshooting on my part.

If the price of oil were to increase over the long term then others will have greater incentives to come up with technology that supports alternate energy (like nuclear energy for example). The saudi's have trillions of dollars in their sovereign wealth funds so they can survive off of weak oil prices for decades. Their likely main concern is instability as when the middle east becomes unstable other countries may want to invade saudi arebia to be able to provide oil/gas to their military machine