OPEC + will discuss the possibility of raising oil production levels at the next meeting, OPEC + sources told Reuters on Wednesday.
The group is due to meet on March 4, where it will discuss increasing production to half a million barrels a day from April, sources said.
OPEC + members are currently cutting oil production by more than 7 million barrels a day, but with oil prices now rising and markets with the idea that the market could shrink, OPEC + could consider loosening the reins. .
The last meeting of the OPEC + Joint Monitoring Committee met in the first week of February and ended without many surprises. For February, other quotas of 75,000 bpd were added to the quotas – 65,000 bpd in Russia and 10,000 bpd in Kazakhstan. For March, production quotas were reduced again by another 75,000 bpd – again to Russia (65,000 bpd) and Kazakhstan (10,000 bpd).
But Saudi Arabia announced in January that it would voluntarily cut another million bpd of its quota in February and March.
Saudi Arabia has not committed to cutting this additional million barrels beyond March, so it is very possible that this OPEC + meeting will end with an additional 1.5 million barrels added to the mix: an additional 500,000 bpd at production and an additional million bpd from Saudi Arabia.
Oil markets have improved in recent weeks, with oil stocks on the world’s most visible oil market, the United States, finally returning to its five-year average. Brent oil prices returned to more than $ 67 a barrel, with WTI trading above $ 63 as of Wednesday afternoon. This is the highest level of oil prices in recent years.
By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com
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