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Oil prices climb on OPEC cut news

04 February 2009 07:38 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Vahab Rzayev â€“ APA-Economics. Crude oil rose for a second day in New York after OPECâ€™s president said the group may reduce output further to trim stockpiles and Asian equities extended gains, Bloomberg reports.
Angolan Oil Minister Jose Maria Botelho de Vasconcelos, the producer groupâ€™s current president, said â€œnew measuresâ€ may be taken at OPECâ€™s March 15 meeting in Vienna if the current round of cuts donâ€™t raise prices. OPEC reduced 1.05 million barrels a day of production last month, according to a survey of producers, oil companies and analysts.
â€œMost indications are that OPEC is moving to a high rate of complianceâ€ with lower output quotas, said David Moore, a commodity strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia in Sydney. â€œThere is certainly the possibility of another cut. OPEC realizes that oil consumption has weakened and they are trying to balance supply against that as a way to support the price.â€
Crude oil for March delivery rose as much as 35 cents, or 0.9 percent, to $41.13 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It was at $40.94 a barrel at 12:20 p.m. Singapore time. Yesterday, futures advanced 70 cents, or 1.8 percent, to settle at $40.78. Prices are down 8 percent this year and 54 percent from a year ago.
Brent crude oil for March settlement was at $44.39 a barrel, up 31 cents, on Londonâ€™s ICE Futures Europe exchange at 12:14 p.m. Singapore time. The contract gained 26 cents, or 0.6 percent, yesterday to end the session at $44.08 a barrel.
The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, responsible for more than 40 percent of global oil supply, agreed on Dec. 17 in Oran, Algeria, to lower production as oil prices headed for their first annual decline since 2001.
OPEC members with output quotas, all except Iraq, pumped 26.2 million barrels a day, 1.36 million more than their target of 24.85 million, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.