Qatar Daily News

Qatar’s oil minister said the market is “well-supplied” and that it was too early to speculate about the outcome of OPEC’s next meeting in March. Abdullah bin Hamad al Attiyah said: “The market is well-supplied … and it’s too early to talk about March now.”

The recent rise in oil prices would not hamper economic recovery, he added.

OPEC members achieved a 66 percent compliance last year with agreed crude output targets, a senior Iranian oil official was quoted as saying earlier on Sunday.

Dow Jones cited Mr Abdullah bin Hamad al Attiyah oil minister of Qatar as saying that members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries shouldn’t change output when they meet this month.

He said that the oil market is very stable and demand is sufficient. Members of the cartel are also showing good compliance

Qatar’s Deputy Premier and Minister of Energy and Industry HE Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah yesterday said Qatar would not work to take advantage of Dubai’s debt crisis.

“In Qatar, we never take advantage of anyone. We are building a real economy,” based on natural gas, petrochemicals and oil, he said. “We are having a very concrete strategy,” al-Attiyah said on arrival in Cairo for a conference of the Organisation of Arab Oil Exporting Countries.
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A senior Qatari energy official said Sunday that OPEC is watching the oil market closely and stands ready to cut output further when it meets next month.

Mohammed Saleh al-Sada, Qatar’s minister of state for energy and industry affairs, told reporters on the sidelines of a conference in Doha that the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries “will respond appropriately” to the rapid drop in oil prices.

“If there is a need, actually, to go down, they will not be hesitant to reduce it further,” he said, without saying by how much.

The oil-producing group, he said, was facing difficulties in setting output because of the “unusual situation” of extreme fluctuation in prices. “The volatility is huge,” said al-Sada.
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Crude oil rose for a second day on signs that OPEC is implementing a record production cut announced in December.

Prices are “firming up” because of output constraint by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, and further cuts may not be necessary, Libya’s top oil official, Shokri Ghanem, said in an interview. A government report later today will probably show U.S. crude stockpiles increased last week, according to a Bloomberg News survey.

“OPEC is still short of their goal but they are making impressive progress,” said Michael Fitzpatrick, vice president for energy at MF Global Ltd. in New York. “The cuts went into effect on Jan. 1 so we probably won’t see the whole impact for another month.”

Crude oil for March delivery rose 98 cents, or 2.4 percent, to $41.76 a barrel at 9:25 a.m. on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Prices are down 6.4 percent this year and 54 percent from a year ago.

OPEC, supplier of more than 40 percent of the world’s oil, may not need to reduce output when it meets next month, Libya’s Ghanem said. The group decided on Dec. 17 to trim output by 9 percent beginning on Jan. 1.
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Small OPEC producer Qatar has told Asian customers it will cut supplies of its main crude oil grade even further in March, while increasing shipments of its smaller stream, trade sources said on Friday.

Qatar, which pumps less than any OPEC member except for Ecuador, has notified at least six Asian term buyers it will cut supplies of medium-heavy Qatar Marine crude by 15 percent from contracted volumes in March.

This more than doubles the 6 percent cut it assigned in February, the traders said.

Qatar’s notice came after top producer Saudi Arabia said it would pump in February below its OPEC target of 8.05 million barrels per day (bpd), undershooting what was already a record supply cut agreed in December.

OPEC oil ministers agreed last month to add a 2.2 million bpd curb on top of earlier agreed reductions of 2.0 million bpd, in a race to balance supply with rapidly crumbling demand for fuel.

However, Abu Dhabi said on Thursday it would slightly increase supplies of its flagship Murban crude to Asia in March from February levels, but kept curbs on supplies on three other main grades unchanged.
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