Too little, too late. "Unconventional" oil and gas has changed everything permanently. Oil won't be going back to $100 a barrel in a hurry, and the Saudis in particular are in real trouble as a result. They should have put money away in the good years, now they are trying to do it when it's tough and getting tougher. There's talk of a partial privatisation off Saudi Aramco but I'm not sure why anyone would want to be a minority shareholder in that - I can't imagine they'd take those shareholders rights and desires much into consideration when setting strategy as it's essentially a political tool of the ruling family - but I guess it'll raise some cash.
The problem though is the budget. They're proposing to sell off the family silver to pay down their over draft,mbut they're still running a massive budget deficit, and the overdraft will simply grow back.
There needs to be massive change, and it'll hurt. But less than the alternative which is to hold on as long as possible and then implode spectacularly.
On the plus side, Russia is probably in a worse position as they are also under sanctions and so have next to no access to western capital markets to help plug the gaps.
Stay away from both.
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