Despite the wild fluctuations that we see in the oil
markets in recent month in the middle of the pandemic, which, more often than
not, punctuated by false dawns, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, the Saudi oil
minister seems to be optimistic about the future of the his field.
Prince AdulAziz, however, chose to exercise caution
in the same breath, because China’s imports are down and the US oil production
has taken a hit already.
He is right because the pandemic has not been that
lethal as it was during the lockdown, despite the explosive infection rates
across the world.
On the other hand, countries that went into lockdown
during the Second Wave, managed to keep the threat at bay with short-swift
measures. For example, both New Zealand and Australia managed to contain the
outbreak.
In those countries, life is limping back to normal
and the demand for oil will go up in proportion.
In this context, Europe will also be able to manage
the crisis in due course, buoyed by the public cooperation and relatively tough
control mechanism. There are still significant amount of traffic on the roads
and the trend will stay that way unless authorities decide otherwise.
In this context, Prince Abdulaziz’s assessment does
not stem from misplaced optimism; on the contrary, it reflects the ground
reality in the months to come.
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