Key Mideast Gulf Arab oil producers could exhaust their fnancial reserves and be forced to signifcantly cut government spending by 2035 because of falling oil revenue as global demand stagnates, the IMF says. The IMF bases its conclusions on a projection that oil demand will peak at around 115mn b/d in 2041, even in the absence of a carbon tax or an acceleration in energy-efciency technologies. Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) members have already drawn down their fnancial reserves in the wake of a prolonged period of low oil prices since 2014. “A path of prolonged deceleration in hydrocarbon revenue growth would add to this decline in wealth,” IMF researchers say. They estimate fnancial reserves across the countries that comprise the GCC — Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE — at $2 trillion.
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