OPEC says it’s stabilised oil market

Key OPEC members said oil prices would be even more volatile if not for the group’s strategy and that the US must trust what it’s doing, as calls from major importers for higher production grow.

“Today’s volatility would have been even worse if OPEC+ were not together and did not exist,” Saudi Arabia’s energy minister, Abdulaziz bin Salman, said at a conference in Dubai on Tuesday.

His comments, echoed by the United Arab Emirates, come as the OPEC+ alliance – which includes Russia – prepares to meet on Thursday to decide on output levels for May. Members have so far signalled they see no need to adapt their supply plans even after crude’s rise to around $110 a barrel in the wake of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its partners have resisted calls from the US, Japan and Europe to raise output faster.

“We’re experts in our field and we’ve been doing it for a very long time and we’ve been successful,” UAE Energy Minister Suhail al Mazrouei said on the same panel. “We’re trying to balance the market and it’s not an easy job. We’re not the only producers in the world and when we say this is the right way to do it, we know it from an experience. So trust us.”