Nigeria’s crude oil output increased by
about 70,400 barrels per day (bpd) to 1,857,000bpd in August 2015, from
its July output of 1,787,000bpd going by the current figures released by
Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) based on secondary
sources in its latest monthly oil market report released on Monday.
Year-on-year, comparison to August 2014 output of 2,008,000bpd shows a
massive drop of 151,000bpd.
“I see Nigeria hitting 2 million plus
output again going by the speed of the ongoing reforms in the sector,”
an energy analyst told BusinessDay in a telephone interview.
Nigeria, however, still maintained its
position as Africa’s number one oil producer in August followed by
Angola and Algeria with an output of 1.735 million bpd and 1.109 million
bpd, respectively.
Total OPEC crude oil production averaged
31.54 million barrels per day in August, up by 99,000bpd over the
previous month. The uptick reflects higher output from Nigeria, Saudi
Arabia and Kuwait.
“Crude oil output increased mostly from
Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, while production in Iraq and Angola
showed the largest drop,” the report said.
Global oil supply decreased by 53,000bpd
to average 94,620bpd in August 2015, compared with the previous month.
This decline was due to the drop in non-OPEC supply. OPEC said it
expected non-member supplies to grow by 880,000 barrels a day, down by
72,000 barrels a day from last month’s report, because of
“lower-than-expected output” from the US. In 2016, non-OPEC supplies are
expected to increase slightly by 160,000 barrels a day, a downward
revision of 100,000 barrels from the previous report.
“US oil production has shown signs of
slowing. This could contribute to a reduction in the imbalance of the
oil market fundamentals, however, it remains to be seen to what extent
this can be achieved in the months to come,” OPEC said.
The OPEC Reference Basket fell below $50
per barrel in August to average $45.46 per barrel, mostly attributed to
sell-offs amid enduring oversupply and Chinese economic turbulence.
Crude oil futures plunged sharply again to multi-month lows, with ICE
Brent ending at $48.21 per barrel and Nymex WTI at $42.89 per barrel.
Speculators continued to be bearish in August with net-long positions in
oil futures and options at record lows. The Brent-WTI spread narrowed
about 52¢ to $5.32 per barrel in August.
On a monthly basis, the OPEC Reference
Basket fell a hefty $8.73 or 16.1 percent to stand at $45.46 per barrel,
on average in August. Year-to-date, the ORB’s value continues to lag at
$53.81 per barrel versus the $104.78 per barrel year-to-date value in
2014.
OPEC, which supplies about one-third of
the world’s crude, revised the demand for its own supplies upward this
year by about 400,000 barrels a day to 29.3 million barrels or 2.2
million a day less than the member countries pumped in July.
By FRANK UZUEGBUNAM
No comments:
Post a Comment