Optimism among Arab circles that oil market will improve by end 2017

Kuwait’s Oil Minister Essam al-Marzouq said the market could gain balance by the third quarter of this year, as long as producers agreed to an OPEC cut-off agreement settled by end 2017.

 

He added that there is some progress towards restoring balance in the market, and that oil production figures in February and March 2017 promise high degree of respect for the implementation of the agreement, but the market still needs complete commitment of all producing countries with the production agreement, otherwise the market will not restore balance in time.

 

Worthy to mention that the Russian Oil Minister had said earlier that the proportion of the commitment of the producing countries to implement what they agreed to amounted to 94%.

 

On the other hand, Iraqi Oil Minister Jabbar Ali al-Allaibi told reporters a few days ago that the Secretary-General of OPEC is currently considering the need to extend the work of the global agreement between oil producers to reduce production. He added that there are encouraging factors that suggest an improvement in the oil market and Iraq will support any measures to help stabilize the market and prices if all OPEC members agree. Luaibi said his country’s production in March was 4.31 million bpd.