Reuters: OPEC’s Oil Production Drops To Lowest Since 2015
OPEC’s oil production in March 2019 fell to its lowest level since February 2015, as Saudi Arabia cut more than it had pledged under the output cut deal and Venezuela continued to struggle amid U.S. sanctions and a major blackout, the monthly Reuters survey showed on Monday.
The combined production of all 14 OPEC members stood at 30.4 million bpd last month, down by 280,000 bpd compared to February and the lowest level of OPEC production since February four years ago, according to the survey.
Production in March beat the previous four-year-low record of the cartel’s oil production from February 2019. As per Reuters survey last month, OPEC’s oil production fell by 300,000 bpd in February compared to January to stand at 30.68 million bpd.
The figures in the survey for March suggest that Saudi Arabia continues to over-deliver in its share of the cuts, as it has promised multiple times since the new OPEC+ deal began in January 2019.
Under the OPEC/non-OPEC agreement for a total of 1.2 million bpd cuts between January and June, Saudi Arabia’s share is a cut of 322,000 bpd from the October level of 10.633 million, to reduce output to 10.311 million bpd.
The rate of compliance from the eleven OPEC members bound by the pact—with Iran, Venezuela, and Libya exempted—also suggests that the Saudis and their Arab Gulf partners are deepening the cuts.
The eleven OPEC members with quotas had a combined compliance of 135 percent in March, surging from 101 percent in February, according to the Reuters survey tracking supply to the market and based on shipping data and information provided by sources at oil companies, consulting firms, and OPEC.
The survey did not provide figures for the Saudi production, but estimated that exempt Venezuela—under U.S. sanctions and suffering from a major power blackout in March—saw its oil production plummet by 150,000 bpd in March compared to February.
