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Saudi Arabia's strategic moves at the OPE pricing meeting in Nov. 2014. Saudis push for keeping the production levels as they are, not making any cuts. Analysts say the Saudis are aware other OPEC countries and other producers outside OPEC such as Russia, are not likely to make cuts in production as they face severe budget constraints- especially Venezuela, Iran, Russia. In this situation they have decided to take a wait and see approach to see where prices are headed in coming months. A price of $60 for Brent crude is likely to lead to cuts, according to some analysts.

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India's Foreign Secretary Ranjan Mathai says India will only give recognition to multilateral sanctions imposed by the United Nations. He said: We have accepted sanctions which are made by the United Nations. Other sanctions do not apply to individual countries. We don't accept that position." He was referring to the sanctions program of the U.S. government, under which countries would be granted exceptions and waivers from U.S. sanctions. Iran is the second largest source for India's oil purchases after Saudi Arabia. A multi-ministerial delegation from India is visiting Iran, and the delegation says Mathai will "work out a mechanism for uninterrupted purchase of oil from Iran and to work out a financing mechanism." South Korea which gets 10% of its oil from Iran plans to get an exception to U.S. sanctions under which it would reduce Iranian imports in 6 months from the date of a U.S. sanctions law.

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Fears that the conflict in Syria might spill over and lead to a conflict with Iran pushed up oil prices. At the same time the new forecast by the International Energy Agency in early August 2012 showing a 20% decrease in demand growth in 2013, as a result of the economic slowdown in the U.S., Europe and China, acted to put a lid on oil price increases. Light sweet crude for September delivery was at $92.87 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange on August 10, 2012, and Brent crude was at $112.95 a barrel on the Intercontinental Exchange.

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Iran will discontinue the second phase of the subsidy reduction program as the currency depreciates drastically in October 2012.

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The views of Anne-Marie Slaughter and other high ranking current and former officials in the Defense Department and State Department on the idea of a military strike by Israel or the U.S. on Iran and the unforeseen consequences.

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Ahmadinejad says at a news conference in New York that he opposed the decision by Iran's central bank to allow the currency, the rial, to drop by about 60% against the dollar in the first 9 months of 2012. The central bank policy is to maintain foreign exchange reserves in the face of stricter international sanctions against Iran's nuclear weapons development program. Ahmadinejad delivered his final address to the UN General Assembly at the end of his second four year term, his last because of Iran's term limits.

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Steven Mufson reports in the Washington Post that oil exports from Iran will only gradually increase by 400,000 barrels a day in the next 6 months, because Iran does not want to depress prices further than $30 a barrel. Foreign investment in Iran is also likely to improve gradually because of the remaining sanctions and the slowly improving economy.

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Improving relations between Turkey and Iran after the election of Rouhani as president of Iran. Efforts by both sides leading Sunnis and Shiites to head off an increase in sectarianism in the Middle East, especially in Syria and Iraq. Both countries agree on the importance of democratically elected governments in the Middle East and reducing conflict.

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Guardian newspaper reports that this maybe the beginning of a technological cold war between western spy agencies and Beijing. The head of the UK's secret service said in a speech that "we need to have a conversation" about Huawei's involvement in UK's telecom network. Following this BT, Brtiish  Telcom, stated it is removing Huawei's networking kit from its EE mobile network. Huawei has struggled against the suspicion that it is under the influence of the government to tap into telecom systems in other countries. This has resulted in it being banned from selling telecom equipment to the U.S., Australia and New Zealand. The Trump administration put a ban on ZTE for breaking sanctions against Iran. Now the Trump administration is making its case that Huawei also is breaking U.S. sanctions against Iran with the arrest in Canada of founder Ren's daughter Meng, who is the CFO. Ren started out working in IT for the military before setting up Huawei in 1987. ...

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Sharp drop in oil prices in Dec. 2015.