It’s only been a few years ago, amid the ramp-up in U.S. shale oil production, that many thought the country would replace Saudi Arabia as global oil markets swing producer – a with good reason. Amid the wonders of fracking to unlock millions of barrels of previously unprofitable oil, the U.S. was flooding the market, so much that it created an unprecedented oil supply overhang that eventually saw prices plunge from over $100/barrel in mid-2014 to under $30/barrel by January 2016, ushering in the worst oil crash in a generation . However, since that time reality has set it. Saudi Arabia convinced non-OPEC producers, including Russia, to join it in wresting back control of global oil markets via the so-called OPEC+ group of producers, and it’s worked. The loose collection of oil producers, just this year have driven oil prices northward nearly 40 percent after their deal to remove […]