[thackney]

These countries are getting killed by cheap oil
http://money.cnn.com/2014/10/30/investing/cheap-oil-prices-hurt-iran-venezuela-saudi-arabia/

Oil is selling for roughly $83 a barrel on the global market. That's bad news for Iran, Nigeria, Venezuela, Russia, and Saudi Arabia, among others. They need the black stuff to trade at far loftier levels in order to balance their budgets.

Iran's budget, for example, is built on oil at $135 dollars per barrel, according to data from Deutsche Bank and Thomson Reuters compiled by DoubleLine Capital.
Russia has oil budgeted at $100, while Saudi Arabia will break even at $95 per barrel.

“All the oil producers are feeling it. Now the question is who can withstand it the most,” said Phil Flynn, an energy analyst at the Price Futures Group.

Drill or die: Flynn claims that energy producing nations will continue to pump up production because they don't want to risk losing market share.

“It's like a staring contest of who can last the longest selling oil below their budget point. Whoever can hold out longest is going to win,” he said. “They're eating at each other.”

[ryan71]

“That view is at odds with most U.S. forecasters, who say output can remain steady at current prices because companies have cut their costs by finding ways to produce oil more efficiently.”

Leave it to Americans to figure out how to cut costs. It’s become our manufacturing culture.

Maybe we’re able to withstand lower prices than the Saudis thought? Maybe their gamble is going to backfire and they’ll end up the big losers?

[Resolute Conservative]

How soon before Barry turns the EPA loose on the industry to invoke even more asinine rules that will aid the foreigners? I don’t care if they all fail I am growing weary of the global market and how it usually screws us because we have to be PC.

[American Constitutionalist]

Captain Kirk: OPEC !
Don’t bet against American innovation and ingenuity.
I bed that Opec’s strategy fails.

[Georgia Girl 2]

We gassed up for $2.84 today at Murphy’s.