Saudi Arabia refuses to cut oil output as ‘no trust’, Iran says freeze is ‘ridiculous’ | The National

Saudi Arabia refuses to cut oil output as ‘no trust’, Iran says freeze is ‘ridiculous’ | The National:

"Saudi Arabia said it won’t cut oil production because it doesn’t trust other countries to join in, insisting instead that high-cost producers ought to bear the burden of reducing the current surplus.

“We are not banking on cuts because” there is “less than trust” that “countries are going to deliver even if they promise,” Saudi oil minister Ali Al-Naimi said in Houston Tuesday. The market will eventually rebalance because high-cost producers will have to “lower costs, borrow or liquidate” to cope with the slump in oil prices, Al-Naimi said, adding that he doesn’t know when the current price rout will end.

“It may sound harsh, and unfortunately it is, but it is the most efficient way to rebalance markets,” Al-Naimi told the IHS CERAWeek conference, an annual gathering of the North American oil industry. “Cutting low cost production to subsidise higher cost supplies only delays an inevitable reckoning.”"



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