Word: cartels
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...bother? Because their host had incited in OPEC's leaders a belief that their moment had arrived and that they'd better seize it. Hugo Chavez Frias, 46, the fiery nationalist President of Venezuela, saw an opportunity in the booming economies of the developed world to turn a moribund cartel back into a global economic powerhouse. Against the backdrop of soaring energy prices, which have tripled during the past two years to a high two weeks ago of $36 per bbl., Chavez took center stage in Caracas last week to proclaim OPEC's "resurrection...
...time the historic meeting adjourned, OPEC's leaders had established for themselves not just a new mandate but also a new identity. Gone are the dictatorial Saudi Arabian edicts of Sheik Ahmed Zaki Yamani, who once practically ruled the cartel, if only by virtue of Riyadh's overwhelmingly dominant role as a producer. The new OPEC is, in the words of an Arab diplomat at Caracas, a "management group." Its new strategists are cosmopolitan technocrats, in some cases U.S.-educated. They speak the language of market economics and are unlikely to rock the global boat with sudden embargoes or regional...
...other words, the new OPEC doesn't want to gouge its customers; it wants global economic stability. That's why at week's end the cartel suggested that its goal was to lift production enough to bring prices down to between $22 and $28 per bbl.--a level that should ease the sense of crisis felt from Washington to Tokyo. Last week the price of crude oil closed...
...them. At one point De Beers controlled 90% of the global diamond supply, sustaining an empire worth $20 billion. But over the past decade, that monopoly has eroded, thanks to the discovery of new diamond reserves and the emergence of upstart producers determined to peddle their goods outside the cartel. De Beers now controls just 60% of the $7 billion market. This summer in London, De Beers all but acknowledged the end of its dominance; the company told its select group of 125 clients that it would no longer be the diamond producers' "buyer of last resort" and would begin...
...supporting the international crackdown on blood diamonds, the cartel is also helping itself by preventing competitors from flooding the market with cheap gems. But while De Beers' cooperation with the embargo may spare the industry the sort of organized boycott that shook the fur trade in the 1980s, it probably won't stamp out trafficking. De Beers claims that only 3% of the global diamond supply comes from African conflict regions. London analysts believe the amount may be as high...