Reply #79: Crude price slide continues [View All]

[Ghost Dog]

http://mwprices.ft.com/custom/ft2-com/html-story.asp?dateid=39126.4044444444-889366313&guid={505EC99B-A594-4E32-A7DC-F63F345FBDB5}

Oil prices continued to retreat on Tuesday after a sharp decline in the precious session prompted by comments from Ali al-Naimi, the energy minister of Saudi Arabia, who warned that the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries might keep production quotas unchanged when the oil cartel meets again next month. ICE April Brent fell 24 cents to $57.57 a barrel in late afternoon trade while Nymex March West Texas Intermediate 24 cents to $57.57 a barrel. Opec has already agreed to reduce output by 1.7m barrels a day but ministers from Kuwait, Nigeria and Algeria have already said they see no need for further supply cuts. On Tuesday, the International Energy Agency raised its forecast for global oil demand growth and warned Opec that further supply cuts could tighten the market significantly. “Opec risks over-compensatting in its attempts to rebalance fundamentals and to support prices above what looks increasingly like a preferred floor of $50 to $55 a barrel,” said the IEA in its monthly report. The IEA said non-Opec demand growth was forecast to rise by 3.2 per cent this year compared with earlier expectations for a 3 per cent, mainly due to higher Chinese consumption. Oil demand in China is expected to rise to 7.6m barrels a day from 7.1m b/d last year.