Saudi Arabia bet that it could defy the U.S. when it pushed for oil production cuts at the OPEC+ meeting, gambling that President Trump would not lash out in retaliation despite some heavy-handed pressure from his twitter feed ahead of the summit in Vienna. This week, the bet seems to have paid off. To be sure, Saudi Arabia’s decision to push for oil production cuts was a bit of a no brainer. The extreme budgetary pressure facing Riyadh from low oil prices is vastly more concerning than any legal or political action from the U.S. Congress or White House. And absent a deal in Vienna, oil prices could have fallen further. “Saudi Arabia today had a ‘Saudi first’ policy,” Helima Croft, global head of commodity strategy at RBC Capital Markets, said shortly after OPEC+ announced its production cuts last Friday. She told CNBC that such a move risked angering […]