Opec oil production hits 10-month low
london/kuwait city/tokyo — Crude production from Opec countries fell to a 10-month low in February, mainly due to maintenance at a field in the UAE and continued output declines in Venezuela.
The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies including Russia have defied the skeptics by going deeper than their pledged cuts and maintaining them for long enough to deplete bloated inventories and boost prices. While the group says it’s committed to the deal for the remainder of the year, it’s also contending with a recordbreaking surge in US output that could undermine its efforts.
Output from the 14 members of the Opec fell 80,000 barrels a day to 32.28 million a day in February, according to a Bloomberg News survey of analysts, oil companies and ship-tracking data. That’s the lowest since 31.89 million in April.
Venezuela’s output dropped by 30,000 barrels a day to 1.68 million barrels. The Latin American nation is a big part of the reason for the Opec’s stellar implementation of promises to curb production. Its industry is suffering from a lack of investment and looming US sanctions, sending output last year to the lowest since the 1980s.
Oil production in the UAE fell last month due to maintenance at fields that produce the Das Blend, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.
The survey found the Arabian Gulf country pumped 2.8 million barrels a day, a drop of 50,000 a day from January.
Production in Saudi Arabia, the Opec’s largest producer, fell 80,000 barrels a day to 9.88 million barrels, the survey found. Libya’s output rose 70,000 barrels a day to 1.05 million, the highest since 2013. Meanwhile, US oil prices fell on Friday, taking declines to a fourth day as Asian share markets extended a sell-off on Wall Street after news of planned US tariffs on steel and aluminium raised fears of a trade war.
Global benchmark Brent was down 2¢ at $63.81 at 0740GMT after spending most of the session slightly higher. The contract settled down 1.4 per cent on Thursday, a two-week low. Brent is set for a weekly fall of 5.2 per cent. US West Texas Intermediate crude was down 11¢, or 0.2 per cent, at $60.88 after also touching a twoweek low of $60.18 a day earlier.
US crude is on track for a 4.2 per cent drop this week, its first weekly decline in three, having given up much of the gains in recent weeks.
“The market is not showing any obvious signs of turning around the mood. We are being driven by the pick-up in US inventories and in general terms the market went a bit too far too soon,” said Ric Spooner, chief market analyst at CMC Markets in Sydney. — Bloomberg /Reuters