Tasnim � Christof Ruhl, a German academic who specializes in energy economics and has been with BP (British Petroleum) since 2005, said Saudi Arabia is losing its oil market share to Iran and Iraq.

�If you�re talking about winners, you can count Iran and Iraq,� Christof Ruehl said recently at a conference in Dubai, Bloomberg reported.

He added that Iran has boosted production in part due to the end of sanctions restricting its oil sales in January 2016.

Iran and the Group 5+1 (Russia, China, the US, Britain, France and Germany) reached a conclusion over the text of a nuclear deal known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in July 2015.

After it came into force in January 2016, the JCPOA terminated all nuclear-related anti-Iran sanctions and Tehran began increasing its oil production and exports.

When OPEC agreed on November 30 to cut output by 1.2 million bpd to 32.5 million bpd for the first six months of 2017, in addition to 558,000 bpd of cuts agreed to by independent producers such as Russia, Oman, and Mexico, Iran, along with Libya and Nigeria, was exempt from the production cuts.