US SPR squeezes Saudi economy
Action by consuming governments has shown they can significantly affect oil prices and put a spoke in OPEC’s wheels
Middle Eastern and Central Asian economic growth is projected to decline to 2.5% in 2023 from 5.4% in 2022, according to the IMF, with a downward revision of 0.4 percentage points compared with the previous forecast being attributable mainly to a steeper-than-expected slowdown in Saudi Arabia. Growth in the Kingdom is expected to fall from 8.7% in 2022 to 1.9% in 2023, a downward revision of 1.2 percentage points. The IMF attributed the slow Saudi growth to an agreement among OPEC+ members to cut output in April this year. Data published about the same time showed Saudi Arabia’s income from oil sales dropped in May 2023 to the lowest level since 2022 (see Fig.1). The IMF economists failed to
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