“Putting aside the fact that Saudi Arabia has no such capacity to bolster its crude output, this demand [by Trump] could be inferred as an order for the kingdom to walk out of OPEC,” Iran’s OPEC governor, Hossein Kazempour Ardebili was quoted as saying by the Iranian Oil Ministry website SHANA on Saturday.
Kazempour Ardebili’s comments were a reaction to the US President Donald Trump’s tweet yesterday, in which Trump said “just spoke to King Salman of Saudi Arabia and explained to him that, because of the turmoil & disfunction in Iran and Venezuela, I am asking that Saudi Arabia increase oil production, maybe up to 2,000,000 barrels, to make up the difference...Prices to high! He has agreed!”
“Members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) decided during the group’s 174th meeting in Vienna last week to maintain their previous agreement to cut output by 1.2 mbd and keep the production ceiling at 32.5 mbd and only diminish over-compliance with the agreement and bring it to 100 percent,” said Mr. Ardebili.
KI/SHANA