Brent Scowcroft Center Resident Senior Fellow for Middle East Security Bilal Y. Saab and Senior Fellow Robert Manning write for Foreign Affairs on the recent trend of falling oil prices:
On Monday, a Saudi general and two border guards died in a shootout along the Iraqi–Saudi Arabian border with fighters thought to be members of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS). The attack—the first against Saudi Arabia since it joined the U.S.-led coalition against ISIS—came amid uncertainty both at home and abroad, over questions surrounding the health of 90-year old King Abdullah, who is in the hospital battling pneumonia, and over the global price of oil.
Oil prices recently dipped below $50 per gallon for the first time since May 2009. Observers have attributed the drop to both an increase in supply, resulting from the shale revolution in the United States, and a decrease in demand, owing to sluggish global growth. All eyes have been on the Kingdom, which houses roughly 73 percent of the world’s proven oil reserves, to cut back its production and help stabilize prices. But Riyadh has refused to play ball, breaking from its traditional preference for high prices, in order to keep pumping.