Soon after Fitch downgrated Saudi Arabia's credit rating to A from A+ on Monday, the kingdom asked the rating agency to reconsider the downgrade.

Fitch Ratings had downgraded Saudi Arabia's Long-Term Foreign-Currency Issuer Default Rating (IDR) to 'A' from 'A+' with a stable outlook.

According to Fitch, the downgrade reflects rising geopolitical and military tensions in the Gulf region, vulnerability of Saudi Arabia's economic infrastructure and continued deterioration in the kingdom’s fiscal and external balance sheets.

Fitch took a swift decision to downgrade the kingdom, the Saudi Ministry of Finance said in a statement.

Earlier in September, attacks on Aramco facilities in Abqaiq and Khurais cut Saudi Aramco’s company's crude oil supply by around 5.7 million barrels per day or about 50 percent of its output.

Saudi Arabia’s oil supply is fully back online after the attacks halved output and the kingdom has reached 11.3 million barrels per day (bpd) capacity and will reach 12 million bpd by the end of November. Oil supply is set to recover to 9.89 million bpd in October and Saudi Arabia will meet all customer oil commitments this month, the statement said.

The downgrade of the rating comes across as somewhat speculative without direct reference to the swift, decisive and effective response to the event, it said.

(Writing by Seban Scaria seban.scaria@refinitiv.com, editing by Mily Chakrabarty)

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