OPEC+ committee recommends returning to August deal parameters

MOSCOW, September 5 – PRIME. The OPEC+ Ministerial Monitoring Committee recommended that the alliance in October return to the August parameters of the oil deal, that is, to reduce production by 100,000 barrels per day, a source in one of the delegations told RIA Novosti.

“The Committee recommended returning to the parameters of the agreement that were in August,” the source said.

According to him, the Minister of Energy of Saudi Arabia, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, noted at the meeting that the increase in OPEC + production by 100,000 barrels per day in September was a one-off. “Voting passed quickly, no one objected,” the source stressed.

OPEC+ cut oil production by 9.7 million barrels per day in May 2020 due to a drop in oil demand caused by the coronavirus pandemic. Then the terms of the agreement were repeatedly adjusted. So, since August, the alliance has moved to the final stage of exiting the cuts announced two years ago, and in September it will increase production by 100,000 barrels per day.

This deal is valid until the end of the year. But in August, Saudi Arabia’s energy minister said OPEC+ would soon begin work on a new post-2022 oil deal. He also noted the discrepancies that exist in the dynamics of the physical and “paper” (exchange) markets, saying that the alliance, as before, has all the necessary leverage to influence volatility, including production cuts. The statements of the Saudi minister on September 1 were supported by Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak.