(New York) Oil prices continued their escalation on Friday, which nothing seems able to stop in the short term, not even a surprise increase in production by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its allies in the OPEC+ agreement.
Posted at 3:31 p.m.
Brent crude from the North Sea for August delivery gained 1.79% to close at $119.72.
The barrel of American West Texas Intermediate (WTI), with maturity in July, rose 1.71% to 118.87 dollars.
“The larger than expected increase in production in July and August, announced yesterday, will not make a big difference for the market,” commented Carsten Fritsch of Commerzbank in a note.
Members of the OPEC+ group have pledged to add 648,000 more barrels per day to their production in July.
This is more than the 432,000 of the previous months, a pace that analysts saw the group maintain during the summer.
“It’s a drop in the bucket,” said Bill O’Grady of Confluence Investment Management.
For Carsten Fritsch, a real increase in the volumes extracted by the OPEC+ group will even be “impossible, because Russian production should decrease” in the months to come. However, the quantities pumped by Russia are included in the OPEC+ figures.
According to Bill O’Grady, more than an attempt to relieve a market under pressure, Saudi Arabia, leader of OPEC, wanted to make a political gesture and “preempt” the meeting to come, at the end of June, between the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and US President Joe Biden.
“When Biden asks them for a favor, they will tell him: we have already done one for you”, anticipates the analyst.
Without much hope of seeing the announcement of the OPEC + group play on the courses, the operators also noted on Friday the publication of the sanctions of the European Union which aim in particular to reduce by 90% the imports of Russian oil into the EU.
“There was a bit of disappointment initially with the byes,” says Bill O’Grady, “but looking at it, it’s pretty huge. »
The clouds therefore continue to pile up on the offer, while the demand relentlessly increases in speed.
In the United States, gasoline prices hit a new high on Friday. Even more worrying, diesel, which had been on hold for several weeks, also reached a new high. Its price has soared 75% in one year.