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OPEC Seen Holding the Line as $40 Crude Looms Over Vienna

It’ll take more than $40 crude to make OPEC change its mind, analysts said before the group’s Dec. 4 meeting in Vienna. In the year since the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries chose to defend its market share, and let prices sink, a 44 percent plunge in crude has slashed members’ revenues by almost half a trillion dollars. Undeterred, the group will press on with its strategy to batter rival producers when ministers meet next week, according to 30 analysts and traders surveyed by Bloomberg. Saudi Arabia, OPEC’s biggest member, appears determined to see through its plan to eliminate a supply glut by squeezing out competitors like U.S. shale drillers, even as the resulting price collapse spurs dissent from Venezuela, Algeria and Iran. The kingdom’s tactic is “having the intended effect” as non-OPEC supply heads for its steepest retreat since the fall of the Soviet Union, according to the […]

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Oil Bulls See Little Chance of Help From OPEC as Supply Grows

Hedge funds are betting OPEC won’t do anything next month to keep crude oil above $40 a barrel. OPEC ministers are likely to keep its output quota steady at a meeting on Dec. 4 in Vienna, according to analysts from JBC Energy GmbH and Societe Generale SA. Last November, Saudi Arabia led the group in maintaining production, accelerating a plunge in oil prices. Supply may swell further next year if Iran resumes sales that were halted by sanctions. “We remain at risk of falling into an even deeper hole,” Tim Evans, an energy analyst at Citi Futures Perspective in New York, said by phone. “We might be looking for the supply surplus to continue through 2016 and through the first half of 2017.” Money managers’ net-long position in West Texas Intermediate crude fell 17 percent in the week ended Nov. 17 to the lowest in more than two months, […]

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Iran says does not need OPEC permission to increase oil production

Iran’s Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh attends an extraordinary ministerial meeting of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) in Tehran November 21, 2015. Iran’s oil minister said on Saturday Tehran does not need to seek permission from OPEC to increase oil production, state news agency IRNA reported. "To increase Iran’s oil production in the global market after the lifting of sanctions, we don’t need permission from OPEC or any other organization," Iran’s oil minister, Bijan Zanganeh was quoted as saying by IRNA on the sidelines of the meeting of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) in Tehran. (Reporting by Bozorgmehr Sharafedin, editing by David Evans)

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Oil Slides as Venezuela Sees Mid-$20 Crude If OPEC Doesn’t Act

Oil fell amid a broader commodity rout while Venezuela predicted prices may tumble to the mid-$20s a barrel unless OPEC tackles the global surplus. West Texas Intermediate futures for January fell as much as 3.3 percent, sliding with industrial metals such as copper, which dropped to the lowest since 2009. Venezuela is urging the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to adopt an “equilibrium price” that covers the cost of new investment in production capacity, Oil Minister Eulogio Del Pino said Sunday. Oil has slumped about 46 percent over the past year amid speculation a global glut will persist as OPEC continues to pump above its collective quota. The 12-member group meets Dec. 4 in Vienna to discuss the production ceiling as Iran signals its intention to boost output by 1 million barrels a day within five to six months of economic sanctions being removed. “The structure of the oil […]

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Saudi Oil Minister Says OPEC With Others to Stabilize Market

Saudi Arabia is working with other OPEC members and producers from outside the group to stabilize the market, Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi said. The world economy is going through an unstable situation, al-Naimi said. Crude demand is expected to rise by 1 million barrels a day every year in this decade, and the world requires more investments in oil to compensate for decline rates, he said. The decline rate of recovery at the world’s oil fields is at about 4 million barrels a day, he said. “Saudi Arabia is a very reliable supplier. We cooperate with OPEC and non-OPEC countries to stabilize the market,” al-Naimi said at a conference in Manama, Bahrain. “We need billions of dollars to continue exploration and producing oil and to invest in spare capacity to stabilize the market.” Threatened by surging production mainly from North America and Russia, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting […]

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OPEC Targets U.S. Shale, But Hits Canada Instead

A bucket loader digs for oil sands at a mine in this aerial photograph taken near Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada, on June 4, 2015. OPEC took a swing at U.S. shale and knocked down Canada. Threatened by surging production from North America, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries has been pumping above its quota for 17 months as it seeks to take market share from higher-cost regions. The resulting 60 percent price crash is hitting Alberta harder than Texas. Canadian producers are struggling to cut the cost of extracting bitumen from the oil sands, and their other wells are failing to match the efficiency gains of U.S. rivals, a Bloomberg Intelligence analysis shows. While output keeps rising in the Permian Basin, the largest U.S. shale play, companies are slowing output from wells in Alberta and have shelved 18 oil-sands projects during the downturn, according to ARC Financial Corp. “OPEC […]

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OPEC Delays Long-Term Strategy Amid Rift Over Production

From left to right, Minister of Oil of Iraq, Adil Abd Al-Mahdi, Minister of oil of Iran, Namdar Zangeneh, Venezuela’s Minister for Petroleum and Mining, Asdrubal Chavez J, and Secretary General of the International Energy Forum (IEF), Aldo Flores-Quiroga, and Secretary General of the Energy Charter, arrive to the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) ‘s 6th International seminar at Hofburg Place on June 3, 2015 in Vienna, prior to the OPEC meeting on June 5, 2015. Approval of five-year plan delayed until 2016, delegates said OPEC’s board of governors was unable to agree on the group’s long-term strategy plan and won’t present it to oil ministers when they meet on Dec. 4 in Vienna, two OPEC delegates with knowledge of the matter said. Approval of the plan is delayed until at least the next meeting of the board of governors in 2016, said the delegates, who asked […]

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Mexico asks to join IEA

Mexico submits request to join the International Energy Agency, saying doing so would advance energy security interests. Photo by tcly/Shutterstock PARIS, Nov. 17 (UPI) — Mexico’s secretary of energy said from Paris his country submitted a formal request to join the Western-backed International Energy Agency. Founded in the wake of an Arab oil embargo in the 1970s, Mexican Energy Secretary Joaquin Coldwell said joining the Paris-based IEA would advance regional interests . "The IEA offers a forum to develop joint answers and global co-operation schemes to guarantee energy security, promote economic development and foster environmental sustainability worldwide," the secretary said in a statement. Mexico is the second-largest economy in Latin America and the fourth-largest producer in the region, after the United States, Canada and Brazil, respectively. The government recently auctioned off rights to 14 tracts covering an estimated 2,600 square miles with reserve estimates of around 686 million barrels […]

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IEA sees bear oil market as stocks balloon

A drop of diesel is seen at the tip of a nozzle after a fuel station customer fills her car’s tank in Sint Pieters Leeuw December 5, 2014. The world is awash with oil having built record stockpiles in recent months and slowing demand growth combined with resilient non-OPEC supply could worsen the glut well into next year, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Friday. "Stockpiles of oil at a record 3 billion barrels are providing world markets with a degree of comfort," the IEA said in a monthly report, adding brimming stocks offer an unprecedented buffer against geopolitical shocks or unexpected supply disruptions. Oil prices have more than halved in the past 18 months with supply bolstered by U.S. shale oil output and OPEC’s refusal to cede market share. [O/R] The IEA said global oil supplies breached 97 million barrels per day in October, up 2.0 million […]

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Agencies: Russia Says OPEC Unlikely To Cut Output At December Meeting

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak says he does not expect the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries to take steps to cut oil output at a meeting on Dec. 4, reports Russian news agencies Interfax and TASS. MOSCOW, Nov 13 (Reuters) – Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said he does not expect the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries to take steps to cut oil output at a meeting on Dec. 4, Russian news agencies Interfax and TASS reported on Friday. "We are not going, let’s put it like this, to lower oil production volumes," Novak was quoted by TASS as saying. "I consider it unlikely, taking into account the position of the biggest producers," TASS quoted Novak as saying. Novak also reiterated that Russia would not deliberately cut its own oil output. "In general we focus on the total amount laid out in the strategy (of energy sector […]

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