> <http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/business/28oil.html>
> January 28, 2007
> Saudi Officials Seek to Temper the Price of Oil
> BY JAD MOUAWAD
>
[....]
> Sometimes, the uncertainty gives rise to more conspiratorial theories.
> Oil traders have been buzzing in recent weeks about whether Saudi
> Arabia was seeking to depress oil markets in hopes of crippling Iran's
> economy, as a Saudi analyst — albeit not one from the government —
> suggested late last year in an opinion article in The Washington Post.
> The Saudis quickly dismissed the claim, but given the tensions in the
> Middle East, oil and politics remain closely linked.
===================================
Also in today's NYT ("On Iran, Bush faces haunting echoes of Iraq"), David
Sanger reports:
"One result was a strategy that Mr. Bush approved in the fall to push back on all fronts and to force Iran to recalculate what administration officials call its cost-benefit analysis for challenging the United States. The effort to stop European and Japanese banks from lending money to Iran’s oil sector is part of the equation. So is pushing down the price of oil, though administration officials grow silent when asked whether Mr. Cheney or others have discussed with Saudi Arabia the benefits of pumping enough oil to push the price down and deprive Iran of revenues."
So perhaps there is something to the speculation by yourself and others about US/Saudi price manipulation, though I'm still inclined to see it as a case of oil conditions coinciding with the foreign policy objectives of the Bush administration until shown otherwise. The administration of course is not loath to take credit for the price decline, as is evident in the coy refusal of unnamed "officials" above to deny the rumours.
Full: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/world/middleeast/28iran.html?_r=1&ref=world&oref=slogin