| Submit your comments on this article |
| International-UN-NGOs |
| Dairy commission nixes request for higher industrial milk prices |
| 2004-07-15 |
| Crude oil futures slipped in New York on Thursday after OPEC said it will proceed with a planned output hike without holding a meeting. In a statement, the 11-member oil group said it decided to go ahead with a plan to raise its official output ceiling by 500,000 barrels a day because a previous production increase hadn’t altered the oil market’s supply-demand equation. Effective Aug. 1, the move will lift OPEC’s output ceiling to 26 million barrels a day. As a result, the statement added, OPEC members see no need to meet July 21 as they had planned but will continue to monitor market conditions and meet again if necessary. It was the first time in 10 years that OPEC canceled an official meeting. The market had already discounted the output increase. OPEC first raised the prospect June 3 when it agreed to hike its production ceiling in two stages, by 2 million barrels a day beginning July 1 and by 500,000 barrels a day beginning Aug. 1. The agreement came after crude futures soared to a record $42.45 a barrel following terrorist attacks in Saudi Arabia. Nevertheless, the OPEC announcement "put to rest any chance that they would not add that additional 500,000 barrels a day," said Tom Bentz, an energy analyst at brokerage BNP Paribas Futures in New York. "All indications in the last few weeks - from Saudis, Kuwaits and others - have been that those additional 500,000 barrels a day of oil were coming," Bentz said. "So maybe the OPEC announcement had a bearish impact." Crude oil futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange set for August delivery settled down 20 cents at $40.77 a barrel. The contract advanced $1.53 a barrel Wednesday. On London’s International Petroleum Exchange, August Brent blend crude futures settled down 43 cents lower at $38.11 a barrel. |
| Posted by:Mark Espinola |