[LINK] "Venezuela and Russia Discuss Coordinating to Defend Oil Price"

[rfmcdonald]

Bloomberg's Robert Tuttle notes an apparent effort by Venezuela and Russia to keep oil prices high. It's not difficult to imagine the geopolitical reasons for this--economic reasons, too, since Russian and Venezuelan exports are so dominated by oil.

Venezuela’s foreign minister and Russia’s oil minister discussed ways to support falling oil prices amid a flurry of meetings by producers before a scheduled OPEC meeting later this month.

Venezuela’s Rafael Ramirez and Alexander Novak talked about “coordinating action” to defend the market, according to a statement published on Venezuela’s foreign ministry website. Crude prices have dropped 31 percent since June amid rising U.S. production and tepid global demand growth.

[. . .]

Brent crude, the benchmark for more than half the world’s oil, fell to a four year low of $76.76 in London on Nov. 14 before closing at $79.41. The price dropped 10 cents to $79.31 today.

While Russia, the world’s second-largest oil producer in 2013 behind Saudi Arabia, isn’t an OPEC member, the country stands to be the biggest loser from the drop in oil prices, according to a Bloomberg Global Poll of international investors. President Vladimir Putin said Nov. 14 that the drop in crude is potentially “catastrophic” for the world’s largest energy exporter.

Venezuela, South America’s biggest oil producer and a member of OPEC, relies on oil for 95 percent of its exports. As prices slumped, the country called for an emergency OPEC meeting last month, a request that wasn’t heeded.