Dubai (AFP) – Top oil producers will consider fresh output cuts at a meeting this week, but analysts are doubtful they will succeed in bolstering crude prices dented by the US-China trade war.
The OPEC petroleum exporters’ cartel and key non-OPEC members want to halt a slide in prices that has continued despite previous production cuts and US sanctions that have squeezed supply from Iran and Venezuela.
Analysts say the OPEC+ group’s Joint Ministerial Monitoring Committee, which monitors a supply cut deal reached last year, has limited options when it meets in Abu Dhabi on Thursday.
UAE Energy Minister Suheil al-Mazrouei said Sunday the group would do “whatever necessary” to rebalance the crude market, but admitted that the issue was not entirely in the hands of the world’s top producers.
Speaking at a press conference in Abu Dhabi ahead of the World Energy Congress, to start Monday, he said the oil market is no longer governed by supply and demand but is being influenced more by US-China trade tensions and geopolitical factors.
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