Daily Times

Brent oil prices rose on Wednesday, after top exporter Saudi Arabia said it would cut crude exports and deliver an even deeper cut to its production, while US futures gained on a decline in domestic oil inventories. Brent crude futures rose 88 cents to $63.30 a barrel by 0950 GMT, while US crude oil futures gained 66 cents to trade at $53.76 a barrel. “The feel-good factor is back in play but oil bulls are by no means out of the woods yet,” PVM Oil Associates Stephen Brennock said. “It is a well-known fact that the world economy is losing momentum amid a plethora of downside risks including lingering US-China trade tensions and geopolitical uncertainty.” The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) said on Tuesday that it had cut its output by almost 800,000 bpd in January to 30.81 million bpd. Most of that reduction has been thanks to Saudi Arabia. Energy minister Khalid al-Falih on Tuesday told the Financial Times production would fall below 10 million bpd in March, more than half a million bpd below the target it agreed to as part of a global deal to limit supply. US restrictions on Venezuela’s energy sector have crippled exports and threaten to remove some 330,000 bpd in supply from the market this year, according to Goldman Sachs. The oil price has risen by 20 percent so far this year, yet most of that increase materialised in early January, before the imposition of US sanctions on Venezuela’s energy sector.

Published in Daily Times, February 14^th 2019.