Saudi Arabia Fears $40-a-Barrel Oil, Too
There is a simple, intuitive logic to the notion that the members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries -- particularly the oil-richest of them all, Saudi Arabia -- want to push oil prices ever higher. They have lots of oil. We buy lots of oil. The higher the price, the more money they take from us.
Simple, intuitive -- and wrong.
Saudi Arabia is as fearful of $40-a-barrel oil as President Bush's re-election campaign is. That is why Saudi Arabia vows so loudly to pump more oil to try to bring prices down. This isn't a political favor to Mr. Bush. It is long-term economic survival.
CAPITAL EXCHANGE
Reader comments -- and David Wessel's answers -- about the Capital column. Published Tuesday mornings.
Submit comments to Mr. Wessel at
capital@wsj.comSaudi Arabia is like a crack dealer. Price the product too high, and customers won't be able to afford the product and might even kick the habit.
"We've got almost 30% of the world's oil," says Adel al-Jubeir, foreign-policy adviser to Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah. "For us, the objective is to assure that oil remains an economically competitive source of energy. Oil prices that are too high reduce demand growth for oil and encourage the development of alternative energy sources."
This isn't merely propaganda. Look at the business of oil through Saudi eyes.
Despite terrorism fears, Middle East unrest and rising interest rates, prospects for the global economy have been looking good. Even Japan seems to be shaking off its torpor. China's thirst for oil gives oil producers a new promising market. A growing global economy means growing demand for oil, and that means OPEC can sell more oil without pushing prices down.
The Saudis and their OPEC allies had been talking about keeping the price of OPEC oil between $22 and $28 a barrel. The target seems to have crept up to $28 to $32 in the past couple of months for several reasons, among them the weakness of the U.S. dollar in global currency markets, which means each dollar earned from selling oil doesn't go quite as far when a Saudi goes shopping in Geneva.
This week, though, OPEC oil is trading above $37 a barrel. (The benchmark commonly cited in the U.S. is about $3 a barrel higher because U.S. crude oil, with its lower sulfur content, is more desirable.) With some merit, OPEC argues it isn't to blame. Demand is stronger than anticipated, it says. Oil markets fear the combination of Iraq, al Qaeda and the Israeli-Palestinian tragedy is lifting chances for a disruption of Persian Gulf supply. The U.S. is short of refinery capacity.
For now, this means more income for oil producers. Cambridge Energy Research Associates, a consulting firm, estimates that OPEC's export revenue will hit $311 billion this year, up 28% from last year. Saudi revenue is expected to rise 15% to $96 billion.
But high oil prices pose three risks to producers.
Risk one is economic. High oil prices threaten global prosperity. Economic forecasters figure a $10-a-barrel increase in oil prices shaves 0.3 percentage point off the U.S. economic growth rate. That means $33 billion less in goods and services for Americans to share. But that probably understates the damage: Somehow high oil prices always do more harm than economists anticipate, perhaps because oil-price increases usually occur with other bad things.
Screwing up the global economy definitely isn't in the Saudis' interests. "They don't want to kill the fatted calf," says Walter Cutler, a former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
Risk two is political. Even if OPEC didn't engineer this price increase, the Saudis know American drivers who are paying $2 a gallon for gasoline will blame them -- and big oil. And the Saudis don't want to be any bigger a factor in the U.S. presidential race than they already are.
Risk three is strategic. The Saudis know the only thing that will get Americans to give up gas-gulping sport-utility vehicles, to cultivate other sources of energy and to practice conservation is high oil prices. The U.S. economy uses a lot less energy to produce $1 of output than it did 30 years ago. But, as Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan observed in a recent speech, most of that change occurred before 1985 "within a few years of the peak in the real [inflation-adjusted] price of oil."
As inflation-adjusted oil and natural-gas prices fell in subsequent years, Americans saw little reason to kick the habit. Higher prices would change that. A new poll of 806 investors found 56% believe the current rise in gasoline prices represents a permanent shift, according to the Gallup Poll Tuesday Briefing.
Not everyone in OPEC can afford the long view. Venezuela, once a voice for moderation in oil prices, is now a hawk: Its oil industry hasn't recovered from President Hugo Chávez's mismanagement and can't increase production. Its cash-strapped government desperately needs more revenue, and higher prices are the only way.
But Saudi Arabia will be in the oil business for another 50 years or more. It wants to be sure American consumers will be willing to pay a good price for oil in 2054, and that requires settling for a lot less than $40 a barrel today.
沙特担心油价上扬为哪桩？
有一个简单的、直觉的逻辑思维，即石油输出国组织(Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, 简称：欧佩克)的成员国，尤其是其中石油储量最大的沙特阿拉伯希望油价进一步走高。这些国家有大量的石油，美国则购买大量的石油。因而，油价越高，他们从美国赚的钱就越多。
这一看法是错误的。
沙特阿拉伯同正在谋求连任的美国总统布什(George W. Bush)一样，都对油价达到每桶40美元感到担忧。这也是沙特阿拉伯大声疾呼要提高石油产量、降低油价的原因。此举并不是在政治上倾向于布什，而是为了长期的经济生存。
沙特阿拉伯就像是一个一流的交易商。产品的价格过高，客户买不起这种产品，就可能会放弃这种产品。沙特王储阿卜杜拉(Abdullah)的外交政策顾问阿德尔?朱贝尔(Adel al-Jubeir)说，沙特阿拉伯的石油储量占全球的三分之一。因此，该国的目标是确保石油仍是一种在经济上具有竞争力的能源。油价过高会降低石油需求的增幅，并鼓励开发其他替代性能源。
这并不是危言耸听。可以从沙特阿拉伯的角度看看石油业。
尽管面临恐怖主义威胁、动荡的中东局势和上调利率的可能性，全球经济前景依然看好。甚至日本也开始摆脱萎靡不振的局面。中国对石油的巨大需求使产油国发现了一个具有潜力的新市场。全球经济的增长意味著石油需求的增长，也意味著欧佩克无需降低油价也能卖出更多的石油。
沙特阿拉伯及其他欧佩克成员国过去曾声称要将欧佩克的油价维持在每桶22美元至28美元之间。而在过去几个月中，价格目标看来已经升至28美元至32美元之间，其原因之一就是美元在全球外汇市场的下跌，这意味著沙特人从出售石油中获得的美元将不如以前的购买力高。
但本周，欧佩克的油价超过了37美元（美国市场常用的基准价要比此高3美元左右，因为美国的原油含硫量较低，因而更受欢迎。）。欧佩克认为，某些具体情况使这一价格无可非议。欧佩克称，对石油的需求要高于预期。石油市场担心，伊拉克局势、基地组织和以色列与巴勒斯坦之间的悲剧等因素综合在一起增加了波斯湾石油供应中断的可能性。美国的炼油能力也无法满足需要。 目前，这意味著产油国将获得更高的收入。咨询机构剑桥能源研究协会(Cambridge Energy Research Associates)预计，欧佩克今年的出口收入将达到3,110亿美元，比去年增长28%。沙特阿拉伯的收入预计将达到960亿美元，比去年增长15%。
但高油价也给产油国带来了三方面的风险。
第一个风险是经济方面的。油价走高威胁著全球经济的繁荣。经济预测学家认为，每桶石油价格上涨10美元将使美国的经济增速降低0.3个百分点。这意味著美国人将少获得330亿美元的货物和服务收入。但这很可能低估了所造成的损失：油价上涨造成的伤害总是要高于经济学家的预期，原因也许在于油价上涨通常都与其他糟糕的事情相伴而至。
阻碍全球经济增长当然不符合沙特阿拉伯的利益。美国前驻沙特阿拉伯大使沃尔特?卡特勒(Walter Cutler)说，沙特并不想杀鸡取卵。
第二个风险是政治方面的。即使欧佩克并不是推动油价走高的罪魁祸首，但沙特明白，以每加仑2美元的价格购买汽油的美国司机还是会迁怒于他们。沙特阿拉伯不想让自己在美国总统选战中变得更加引人注目。 第三个风险是战略方面的。沙特清楚，让美国人放弃非常耗油的运动型多用途车，转而开发其他能源的唯一动力就是油价的上涨。美国经济创造1美元产值所消耗的能源要大大低于30年前。但正如美国联邦储备委员会(Fed)主席格林斯潘(Alan Greenspan)在最近的讲话中所强调的，这种改变主要是在1985年前经通货膨胀因素调整后的实际油价达到高峰那几年间发生的。
经通货膨胀因素调整后的石油及天然气价格在随后几年出现了下跌，美国人认为没有理由再改变习惯。油价上升会改变这点。根据盖洛普公司(Gallup Organization, Inc.)周二发布的简报，接受调查的806名投资者中，有56%的人认为当前汽油价格的攀升将带来长久的转变。
并非所有的欧佩克成员国都持有这种长远观点。一度赞成将油价维持在适度水平的委内瑞拉现在却持强硬立场：该国的石油工业尚未从总统乌戈?查韦斯(Hugo Chavez)的管理不善中复苏，因而无法提高产量。财政窘迫的该国政府迫切需要增加收入，而油价上涨几乎是唯一的途径。
但沙特阿拉伯还要依靠石油业50年甚至更长。它希望确保美国消费者在2054年能以较高的价格购买石油，这就需要目前满足于油价大大低于每桶40美元。
