Drone attacks on oil facilities in Saudi Arabia disrupted domestic production and rattled the global oil market. As a result, state-owned energy producer Saudi Aramco had to slash almost half of its output that equals over 5 million barrels per day. On the global scale, the drone strike knocked out almost 20% of crude supplies or 29.6 million barrels per day. Experts estimate that the global crude production slumped by nearly 6%.

Citing Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, who also heads the energy ministry, the loss of 5.7 million barrels per day deals a devastating blow to the domestic economy as it accounts for 50% of the total oil output in Saudi Arabia.

Houthi rebels in Yemen claimed responsibility for the attacks on the world's biggest crude-processing facility in Abqaiq and the kingdom's second-biggest oil field in Khurais. The bulk of Saudi’s oil exported from the Gulf is processed in Abqaiq. Interestingly, Aramco stated that it is able to restore significant volumes of oil production in a few days.

Despite confessions of the Houthi, the old allies – the US and Saudi Arabia – accuse their common foe Iran. "Amid all the calls for de-escalation, Iran has now launched an unprecedented attack on the world's energy supply," US State Secretary Mike Pompeo tweeted citing the lack of evidence that Yemen is involved into the assaults.

The policymaker called on other countries to condemn the Islamic Republic. Besides the US President pledged to use oil from the US emergency oil reserves "to keep the markets well-supplied." In response, Iran’s authorities described such accusations as "blind and fruitless."