The biggest beneficiaries of OPEC’s decision to shrink oil production will include its most implacable enemies: U.S. shale drillers. After a 2 1/2-year price war in which the the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries sought to starve shale explorers and other high-cost producers into submission, the group agreed Wednesday to curb output by 1.2 million barrels a day. The deal to reverse the previous policy of letting the taps flow freely sent crude prices soaring more than 8 percent in London and New York and swelled the U.S. oil industry’s market value by more than $80 billion, more than the entire annual economic output of nations such as Kenya or Croatia. The top 18 performers on the Standard & Poor’s 500 index were energy companies. “The announcement this morning on OPEC cuts is certainly near-term positive,” Newfield Exploration Co.’s Chairman and […]