OPEC Doesn't Need Emergency Meeting as Oil Advances Above $90, Iran Says
OPEC has no reason to call an emergency meeting even as oil climbs above $90 a barrel because the market is well-balanced and doesn’t need further supply, Iran’s OPEC governor said.
“Oil at $90 is not an extraordinary situation,” Mohammad Ali Khatibi said by phone from Tehran today. “There are some temporary supply issues, but stocks are high and there is no permanent shortage in supply.”
The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, which produces 40 percent of global oil supply, will meet about a week later than scheduled, on June 7 or 8, to allow energy ministers to attend the Gas Exporting Countries Forum gathering on June 2, Khatibi said.
Surging oil and food prices are fuelling concern among central banks that rising inflation may threaten the global economic recovery. The International Monetary Fund in October forecast that growth in the world economy will slow to 4.2 percent this year from 4.8 percent in 2010.
Crude rose to the highest in more than a week after a Jan. 8 pipeline closure in Alaska reduced supply in the U.S., the world’s largest oil consumer. Futures for February delivery gained as much as 63 cents, or 0.7 percent, to $91.74 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, and traded at $91.58 at 9:27 a.m. London time.
Oil inventories in industrialized nations are at about 60 days of forward cover, six or seven days more than the five-year average, suggesting there is no shortage of supply, he said.
U.S. crude stockpiles probably dropped for a sixth week, which would be the longest stretch of declines since July 2009, according to a Bloomberg News survey before an Energy Department report today.
OPEC won’t hold an emergency meeting if oil hit $100 a barrel, Kuwait Oil Minister Ahmad Al-Abdullah Al-Sabah said yesterday. He said Jan. 5 that a price of $80 to $100 was fair.
The group decided at its last meeting in Quito, Ecuador, on Dec. 11 to maintain its production target of 24.845 million barrels a day, set in 2008.
To contact the reporter on this story: Ayesha Daya in Dubai at adaya1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Stephen Voss at sev@bloomberg.net
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