Liam Denning, Columnist

Saudi Attacks Haven’t Spooked Oil Enough

A more disjointed energy market is a jumpier energy market.

September 20, 2019 at 1:13 PM UTC

Liam Denning is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering energy. A former banker, he edited the Wall Street Journal’s Heard on the Street column and wrote the Financial Times’s Lex column.

Smoke billowing from an Aramco oil facility in Abqaiq in Saudi Arabia's eastern province. — Smoke billowing from an Aramco oil facility in Abqaiq in Saudi Arabia's eastern province.
Photographer: -/AFP/Getty Images

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Five bucks? Are you kidding me?

A mysterious attack took out almost six million barrels a day of Saudi Arabian oil supply, and almost a week later we’re up less than the price of a beer. Which means the market worked. Prices spiked in the immediate aftermath, and then soothing words from Saudi Arabia calmed everyone down to the point they remembered how bleak things look for oil in 2020. So prices fell again, albeit not the whole way back; after all, explosions are unsettling things – more unsettling than the price indicates, in this case.