OPEC met over the weekend to monitor the collective production cuts and assess the status of the oil market, and the meeting was shrouded in rumor about the potential cracks in the resolve of the group to keep the cuts in place through the rest of this year. Heading into the meeting, a growing number of investment banks had predicted that the deal would come to an end earlier than expected, perhaps by mid-year. These predictions forced top OPEC officials to issue public statements that the deal would remain intact. But over the weekend, Saudi Arabia’s oil minister went further, hoping to stamp out any notion of OPEC cohesion falling apart. Khalid al-Falih not only spoke about the longevity of the current production cuts, but he looked to a more permanent arrangement. “We should not limit our efforts to 2018. We need to be talking about a longer framework […]