<story><title>Oil&apos;s Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise</title><url>https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2020-04-29/covid-19-oil-collapse-is-geopolitical-reset-in-disguise</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>xiaolingxiao</author><text>I found this part really interesting:
&amp;quot;For dozens of oil producers, the plunge in oil prices is devastating. No major oil producer can balance its budget at prices below $40; according to the International Monetary Fund, with the exception of Qatar, every country in the Middle East requires at least $60, with Algeria at $157 and Iran at a whopping $390. The average Brent price of oil over the past month has been a hair above $20.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s fascinating the cost of extracting oil is so high in Iran in particular, a country that is under constant sanction by the US. I wonder how much of the cost is due to the sanctions and disturbance in trade (ie Iran cannot import key technologies), and how much of it is because Iran&amp;#x27;s oil deposits is just &amp;quot;harder&amp;quot; to drill.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>mbreese</author><text>&amp;gt; the cost of extracting oil is so high in Iran&lt;p&gt;I think you might be reading that wrong. It isn’t that the cost of extracting the oil
is so high, but that the budgets of these countries depends on the price of oil being high. When the price drops, they can no longer cover their entire budget and will need to borrow or reduce their spending.&lt;p&gt;These numbers aren’t related to the cost of extraction (which is a different issue but is also variable between different regions).</text></comment>
<story><title>Oil&apos;s Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise</title><url>https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2020-04-29/covid-19-oil-collapse-is-geopolitical-reset-in-disguise</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>xiaolingxiao</author><text>I found this part really interesting:
&amp;quot;For dozens of oil producers, the plunge in oil prices is devastating. No major oil producer can balance its budget at prices below $40; according to the International Monetary Fund, with the exception of Qatar, every country in the Middle East requires at least $60, with Algeria at $157 and Iran at a whopping $390. The average Brent price of oil over the past month has been a hair above $20.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s fascinating the cost of extracting oil is so high in Iran in particular, a country that is under constant sanction by the US. I wonder how much of the cost is due to the sanctions and disturbance in trade (ie Iran cannot import key technologies), and how much of it is because Iran&amp;#x27;s oil deposits is just &amp;quot;harder&amp;quot; to drill.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>rckoepke</author><text>Iran&amp;#x27;s oil is not expensive to extract. These aren&amp;#x27;t marginal break-even prices on each barrel of oil...rather they&amp;#x27;re how much their current oil production would have to be sold for in order to balance their national budget, which includes defense and healthcare and whatnot.&lt;p&gt;79% of Iran&amp;#x27;s exports are unrefined crude oil: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;commons.wikimedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;File:Islamic_Republic_of_Iran_Exports_Treemap_2017.svg&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;commons.wikimedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;File:Islamic_Republic_of_...&lt;/a&gt; (edited to 2017)&lt;p&gt;Countries typically &amp;quot;go bankrupt&amp;quot; in a practical sense (with very noticeable real-world effects on the local citizens) when their foreign reserves run out.</text></comment>