Today is a different game - hidden agneda?
With Shale producers in US able to ramp production up or down in a relative blink of the eye, Saudis seem to have 2 choices: 1) To keep Shale producers at bay, flood the market with cheap oil until they run dry at super cheap prices 2) Back off on their low price production and sell less at higher prices as the Shale guys pop back up for air.
Which begs the questions:
~ How many years can they keep their spigots full open?
~ What is their fall back plan when declines take hold in earnest?
~ Why would they rather sell more quantity for cheap, than less quantity for more?
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Diplomatic cables leaked during the United States diplomatic cables leak in 2011 revealed that Sadad al Husseini, former vice president of Saudi Arabia's oil monopoly Saudi Aramco, warned the US that the oil reserves in Saudi Arabia might in fact be 40% (300 billion barrels) lower than claimed.[14][15]"
[url= https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_reserves_in_Saudi_Arabia] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_reserves_in_Saudi_Arabia[/url]