According to the Monthly Oil Market Report, the Organisation of Petroleum
Exporting Countries has increased production of crude oil by 810,000 barrels
per day.
The report said that the OPEC Reference Basket retreated in March by USD 1.60
to USD 52.46 per barrel as the market refocused on the oversupply situation as
demand remained subdued. ICE Brent and Nymex WTI futures contracts also fell
USD 1.86 and USD 2.87 to average USD 56.94 per barrel and USD 47.85 per barrel,
respectively, for the month. The Brent-WTI spread widened to around USD 9 per
barrel.
According to OPEC, product markets remained healthy in the Atlantic Basin in
March. Higher gasoline demand ahead of the driving season provided support amid
tight sentiment fuelled by the heavy maintenance season and some outages in the
US. Meanwhile, the Asian market exhibited a positive performance supported by
the increasing light and middle distillates demand in several countries in the
region.
It stated that it will continue increasing output, despite an oversupply,
projecting an increased demand of 80,000 barrels per day higher for this year
than anticipated.
For the month of March, OPEC produced an average of about 30.79 million barrels
per day, representing an increase of 810,000 barrels per day.
OPEC explained that “Crude oil output increased mostly from Saudi Arabia and
Iraq, while Libya saw a return of about 165, 000 barrels per day from shut-in
wells in active oil fields.”
In 2015, non-OPEC oil supply is now projected to grow by 0.68 million barrel
per day, following a downward revision of 165 tb/d compared to the previous
assessment. US tight oil and Canadian oil sands output are expected to see
lower growth following the recent strong declines in rig counts. OPEC NGLs are
expected to grow by 0.19 million barrel per day in 2015, following growth of 0.18
million barrel per day last year. In March, OPEC crude production increased by
0.81 million barrel per day to average 30.79 million barrel per day.
The mission of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries is to
coordinate and unify the petroleum policies of its member countries and ensure
the stabilization of oil markets in order to secure an efficient, economic and
regular supply of petroleum to consumers, a steady income to producers and a
fair return on capital for those investing in the petroleum industry.
Source: steelguru