![\"Saudi](\"http:\/\/static.businessinsider.com\/image\/4bcdf18c7f8b9ade168e0600-400-\/saudi-arabia.jpg\")
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Talk about getting comfortable with the multi-year commodities super-spike we’ve had…<\/p>\n
Saudi Arabia’s National Commercial Bank has disclosed that its government requires $60 just to break even on its budget these days.<\/p>\n
Yet they’re actually aiming for $75 oil in 2010, which will provide them with a healthy $24.3 billion budget surplus.<\/p>\n
Upstream Online:<\/a><\/p>\n The kingdom may end up spending 12% above the 540 billion riyals it budgeted for this year and get revenues 48% above the planned 385 billion riyals, Reuters quoted Said al-Shaikh, chief economist at National Commercial Bank (NCB), as saying.<\/p>\n “Crude oil prices, based on a modest recovery in global demand, are expected to average $75 (per barrel) with Saudi production rising to 8.3 million barrels per day,” Shaikh told a conference.<\/p>\n …<\/p>\n After declining by almost 8% in 2009, net foreign assets held by the Saudi central bank are set to rise by almost 10% this year to $445.2 billion, surpassing their lifetime record of 2008, Shaikh said, based on assumptions of daily production of 8.3 million bpd and a $75 average price for oil.<\/p>\n So they’re budgeting for $60 oil (where the budget breaks even) while wondering what to do in their likely expected scenario whereby oil remains around $75.<\/p>\n Which means $60 per barrel is the new cheap oil, since Saudi Arabia runs a deficit at any price lower.<\/p>\n Note OPEC has been pretty adamant recently about defending the $70 – 80 oil band, and at a recent oil conference even forecast that oil could remain between $70 – 80 per barrel for ten years<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n Luckily for the rest of the world, OPEC’s control over the global oil market is clearly dying<\/a>. So it might not be up to them anymore, really.<\/p>\n