Saudi Arabia’s 2015 Budget May Assume Oil Prices At $80 -- Report
The global prices for crude oil have been falling since their peak in July this year. The commodity is currently trading at just over $54. A new report suggests that Saudi Arabia, a major producer, may be expecting the commodity price to rebound to $80 in 2015.
Revenues from oil sales form a major portion of the budgets of oil producing countries. According to a report by Bloomberg a former adviser to Saudi Arabia's government is expecting the Gulf nation to assume an oil price of $80 for the 2015 budget.
John Sfakianakis, who was Saudi Arabia's chief economic adviser, has reportedly said that there is an assumption of $80 for the 2015 budget of Saudi Arabia. The assumption will reportedly send a strong signal by the country to the oil market. The country recently made an announcement of the revenues and expenditures in its budget.
Saudi Arabia has set a expenditure target of 860 billion riyals against a revenue target of 715 billion riyals. According to a press release, the government estimates the total revenue for the year 2014 to be 1046 billion riyals. The total government expenditure in 2014 was 1100 billion riyals.
Other Gulf countries are also expected to scale down their expectations when it comes to revenues from oil sales. Iraq is reportedly assuming the oil price to be around $ 60 and is said to be basing its 2015 budget around this price.
But not all countries are negatively affected by the drop in oil prices. The countries that import the commodity are expected to benefit from the low oil prices. According to a report by Reuters the German government sees their economy growing by an additional 0.2-0.3 percent in 2015 because of the low oil prices.
The report is based on an internal economy ministry memo of the German finance ministry that was cited by Der Spiegel magazine on Sunday. The memo reportedly talks about the German Ministry expecting the oil prices to remain low for the long-term and only hit $ 80 in the year 2018.
The German government will reportedly grow by 1.3 percent in 2015. This will mark an increase from the predicted growth of 2014 that stands at 1.2 percent. The global oil prices are dependent on the level of economic activity in major economies as well as the supply of the commodity in the market. Saudi Arabia reportedly expects oil prices to bounce back as the economic activity increases in the world and some high cost oil producers cut production.
s.trivedi@ibtimes.com.au