In the years I've followed the oil market, I have never seen the Saudis this determined to push oil prices up. This includes the "whatever it takes" moment we saw in 2017 when the previous Saudi energy minister, Khalid Al-Falih, started targeting US inventories, and the price war of 2020 when the Saudis went out to crush the Russians for not agreeing to a production cut.
Saudi crude exports for the first 24 days of August are averaging at the lowest level since June 2020. At ~5.3 million b/d, Saudis will have reduced crude exports by ~1 million b/d since July. Now we don't expect this figure to be final. Crude exports for the upcoming week are showing a rebound, so final figures could be closer to 5.6 to 5.8 million b/d.
But that doesn't change the point of this article, this is crazy, and I've never seen the Saudis this determined.