Drone attack on Aramco: Oil prices soar 20% after attack

By Newsmeter Network  Published on  16 Sep 2019 6:41 AM GMT
Drone attack on Aramco: Oil prices soar 20% after attack

Hyderabad: Recording the biggest jump in the last 28 years, global oil prices have been steadily climbing after the latest attack on Aramco oil reserves in Saudi Arabia region. As a result, the Brent crude, the global benchmark oil price, shot up 19.5 per cent on Monday. In recent times, the 20 per cent jump is considered to be one of steepest upward moves in the global markets. The Brent was trading at $66/90 a barrel, a 12 per cent rise from Friday’s close. The Brent crude oil prices were dropping for the previous four sessions thanks to sluggish demand and US-China trade tension.

Oil experts forecast that Brent price may touch $80 a barrel and WTI at $75/BBL. However, this is subject to updates from Aramco, observes an analyst.

Using drones, Yemen’s Houthi rebels on Saturday attacked two major oil facilities of Aramco, a state-owned company in Saudi Arabia, said the Kingdom’s Interior Ministry.

After the attack, the drones caused a fire to the refinery in the city of Abqaiq in the Kingdom’s oil-rich Eastern Province. Further, the Khurais oil field also caught fire. If the outage lasts for weeks, the Brent oil price surge will continue further.

If the outage of 4 million barrels per day (mb/d) continues for three months, then oil price may touch $75 a barrel.

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