Non-Opec producers urged to cut output

Oil producers outside of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) should cut “irresponsible” output with excess supplies harming the market, said the United Arab Emirates energy minister.

The oil market is over-supplied by 2m barrels a day, Mohammed Al Sada, Qatar’s energy minister, said in an interview on the sidelines of a conference in Abu Dhabi.

Opec has produced about 30m barrels a day since January 2013 while global output climbed more than 2m barrels a day to 93.6m, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

“We call on all other producers to stop the increase because the increase is harming the market,” UAE energy minister Suhail Al Mazrouei said in a separate interview at the conference.

“If the increase stops, and they follow Opec’s lead, Opec’s decision is to fix production, if production stabilises in 2015 things will stabilise much faster.”

Brent oil prices tumbled 45% this year. Opec decided last month to keep production unchanged at 30m barrels, resisting calls from cash-strapped Venezuela that the group needs to stem the rout in prices.

“Irresponsible production from outside Opec is behind the fall in prices,” Mazrouei said. “The market will improve over time.”

Output in the US is the highest in three decades, and production is poised to approach a 42-year high next year as declining equipment costs and enhanced drilling techniques more than offset the drop in oil markets, according to Troy Eckard, whose Eckard Global owns stakes in more than 260 North Dakota shale wells.

While US oil drillers idled the most rigs in almost two years this month as they face falling oil prices, Opec is resisting calls to cut its output and Exxon Mobil plans to increase production next year.

“It’s a normal process, that the efficient producers produce,” Saudi Arabia’s oil minister Ali al-Naimi said.

The estimate of a 2m barrel oversupply is more than the 540,000-barrel surplus signaled from International Energy Agency figures as of September 30.

Global production was 93.6m barrels a day compared with demand of 93.06m barrels, IEA figures show. Global output was 90.54m barrels a day in early 2013.

“We are now in a provisional, correctional period,” Qatar’s Al Sada said. “Markets have stabilisation mechanisms that will bring stability. We don’t know exactly how long it will take but it will stabilise because the current prices will separate the efficient producers from the producers who have high costs.”

Bloomberg