A month after President Donald Trump announced that the United States was withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal and re-imposing sanctions on Tehran’s oil, Iran’s archrival and OPEC’s de facto leader Saudi Arabia got in June its Arab Gulf fellow cartel members and OPEC+ deal partner Russia on board to start pumping more oil to offset the expected loss of Iranian supply. Just five months later, Saudi Arabia and OPEC are hinting at a fresh oil production cut, as rising production and signs of waning demand growth point to oversupply next year. The oil market and analysts—who were questioning just two months ago the Saudi and Russian ability to offset expected steep Iranian losses—are now thinking that OPEC and its allies reacted too early to come to the rescue of global oil supply. Analysts say that President Trump, intentionally or not, ‘duped’ the Saudis into overproducing to compensate for […]