OPEC Output Falls in April Despite Saudi Arabia Bump

May 11, 2017 Share Print 0

OPEC continued to reduce production in April, but output from top exporter Saudi Arabia ticked up last month.

In its monthly report Thursday, the producer group raised its forecast for oil supply growth from nonmembers in 2017 but kept its outlook for global crude demand unchanged.

Saudi crude oil production rose by nearly 50,000 barrels per day last month, according to figures from the kingdom and secondary sources. OPEC took about 18,000 bpd off the market in April, according to secondary sources listed in the OPEC report.

Saudi Arabia is still pumping well below the level it agreed to in November, when OPEC agreed to reduce its combined oil output by 1.2 million bpd in order to shrink huge global stockpiles and balance an oversupplied market.

But the market closely watches Riyadh’s production because it has delivered the lion’s share of OPEC’s cuts during the first four months of the six-month deal. Oil prices pared gains immediately after OPEC released the report but later regained some ground.

Future prices got support this week after Saudi Arabia announced it had cut crude exports to the key Asian market. Data from tanker tracking firm ClipperData shows Saudi loadings for export fell by 670,000 barrels a day in April from October, the level against which OPEC measures compliance to the output cut deal.

via CNBC

Content is for general information purposes only. It is not investment advice or a solution to buy or sell securities. Opinions are the authors; not necessarily that of OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc. or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, officers or directors. If you would like to reproduce or redistribute any of the content found on MarketPulse, an award winning forex, commodities and global indices analysis and news site service produced by OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc., please access the RSS feed or contact us at info@marketpulse.com. Visit https://www.marketpulse.com/ to find out more about the beat of the global markets. © 2023 OANDA Business Information & Services Inc.

Bio
Twitter
Google+
Latest Posts

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse

Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.