
© Reuters / Sergei Karpukhin
FILE PHOTO: The Ashalchinskoye oil field, the Republic of Tatarstan, Russia
US economic pressure on Iran and Venezuela has deprived world oil markets of two large exporters. However, this gap has been filled by Russian supplies, earning its oil firms at least $905 million in cash, according to Bloomberg.
The demand for Russian crude has also been boosted by the output cuts imposed by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and allied major oil exporting states. The two factors reportedly allowed Russia's Urals blend oil to gain leverage over Brent, the global benchmark against which Urals blend has traditionally traded at a discount.
Urals is heavy oil. It is a mix of the sour oil of the Urals and the Volga region with the light oil of Western Siberia. Analyst at JBC Energy, Konstantsa Rangelova, explained that sanctions on Iran and Venezuela had created a shortage of competing heavier, sourer crude.
This brought the demand for Urals blend in the Mediterranean to "an all-time high."
As of Thursday the blend was trading at $56.12 per barrel, while Brent neared $59 per barrel.
Comment: The evidence of Obama's complicity seems pretty clear: