Quote:
Originally Posted by T@T
It was to keep the peace(price peace) for the most part but since shale oil came on the scene it's been dwindling to the point where North America only buys about 15-18% from OPEC. The Saudi's/OPEC are getting squeezed by us in the west and Russia in Europe.
To give you an idea of the extent that this has hurt the Saudi's, In 1980 50% of Saudi oil was sold to Europe, in 2013 about 6% went to Europe. Now Russia has taken over the EU oil share to estimates of 35%.
We are now in the cat&mouse game, OPEC wants to crush expensive shale/dirty oil by flooding the market with their "straw in the sand" oil and about $650 billion in oil reserves.
Personally I would love to set up a second oil cartel, Venezuela and Canada are #2-3 in the world for oil reserves, USA and Mexico are top 10. I say let OPEC and Russia/Iran fight it out for EU supremacy and we look after the America's.
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To clarify the US only buys about 15% of its
imports from the middle east. The US now produces the majority of its own oil.