Saudi Aramco is apparently going to start shipping oil to us once again, picking up deliveries on a five-year, USD 23 bn supply agreement with as much transparency as it cut them off in October. Oil Minister Tarek El Molla made the announcement in a statement yesterday. There remains no schedule for the resumption of shipments, but El Molla said there have been “ongoing discussions” between the two sides, stressing that the agreement had never been scrapped. Saudi state oil giant Aramco’s decision to unilaterally stop shipments last year came amid political tensions between Cairo and Riyadh over the situation in Syria and Yemen, among other issues. According to the ministry, the decision to postpone the shipments were due to commercial reasons, including changes in global oil prices and Saudi Arabia cutting back on its oil production.

When will shipments resume? Reuters asked if it would be a matter of weeks, but an unnamed official at the Oil Ministry replied, “No, no, we are talking about a very short time period.”