Benzinga - by Neil Dennis, Benzinga Staff Writer.
Oil prices fell during afternoon trade on Friday, as OPEC+ was reported to be close to a deal that will bring more oil onto the market from African-producing members of the oil cartel.
In mid-afternoon trade, Brent Crude was down 1.3% at $80.35 a barrel, while US West Texas Intermediate fell 2.4% to $75.27 a barrel. The United States Oil Fund (NYSE:USO) an exchange-traded security that tracks the price of light sweet crude, fell 1.1% to $70.83.
African Producers Unhappy: Members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies were supposed to be meeting this weekend at the cartel’s headquarters in Vienna to discuss current quotas — with Saudi Arabia and Russia, the world’s biggest two producers, expected to cut their output to stabilize falling prices.
Angola and Nigeria, however, unhappy with their new quotas — at 1.28 million barrels a day and 1.38 million b/d respectively — set for them at the June meeting, forcing the group into discussions and the cancellation of Sunday’s meeting.
Talks between the African nations and the other members were reported to be close to agreement, which will likely see Angola and Nigeria with raised quotas. Indeed, Nigeria was pumping 1.416 million b/d in October, according to OPEC data.
Also Read: OPEC To Discuss Deeper Production Cuts To Underpin Volatile Oil Prices
Saudi Arabia And Russia Seen Extending Curbs: Had this weekend’s meeting gone ahead as scheduled, oil analysts had expected OPEC+ to extend production cuts already in place by at least another 1 million barrels a day — with most of the additional cuts coming from Saudi Arabia and Russia.
With curbs of around 5 million b/d already in place, the additional cuts would likely have run through until the end of the first quarter 2024 before being gradually unwound as any market surpluses faded.
Oil prices have been under pressure for much of the week, following U.S. inventory data on Tuesday that showed stockpiles grew by more than expected in the previous week. Stockpiles increased by 8.7 million barrels – analysts polled by the Wall Street Journal had only expected stocks to rise by 100,000 barrels.
Now Read: Oil Prices Slide As OPEC+ Postpones Output Meeting
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