An oil and energy news-site, oilprice.com, recently said that a Biden victory would cause a “huge oil glut”. This would be due to Biden’s foreign policy with Iran. An official from Bahrain emphasized the sentiment saying Biden taking the White House could threaten peace deals in the Middle East, that the Trump administration has recently brokered, in addition to swamping the market with oil.
A Bahraini diplomat said that if Trump stays in the White House for four more years, that would “result in a flood of moderate Arab and Muslim countries signing peace agreements… a Biden victory will see many of the countries that are currently exploring the possibility of normalizing relations [with Israel] take a step back and revisit the risk they are taking.”
In an op-ed in September, Biden wrote, “There’s a smarter way to be tough on Iran than President Trump’s hard line on the Islamic Republic…I will offer Tehran a credible path back to diplomacy. If Iran returns to strict compliance with the nuclear deal, the United States would rejoin the agreement as a starting point for follow-on negotiations. With our allies, we will work to strengthen and extend the nuclear deal’s provisions, while also addressing other issues of concern.” Indicating that he would be open to taking down sanctions imposed on Iran.
Tsvetana Paraskova, of oilprice.com, said, “As if the oil market needed another uncertainty in the year of the pandemic, a Joe Biden win at next week’s U.S. presidential election could have a significant impact not only on the American oil industry but also on global crude supply within a year.”
During the final debate, Biden also vowed to gradually stop oil and gas production in the US, citing climate change reasons. This news was met with criticism from Greg Abbott, who is the governor of Texas, the largest crude producing state in the US. He tweeted, “Biden wants to ‘transition’ away from the oil industry. He just killed paycheck[s] earned by hardworking families in Texas. Joe just wants to transition away from Texas. Remember that on election day.”
The US Treasury Department has imposed sanctions on Iranian minister of petroleum, the National Iranian Oil Company, and National Iranian Tanker Company. Biden relieving these sanctions could result in an additional 2 million barrels per day of Iranian oil exports coming into the market over a year or so.
