Azerbaijan, Baku, 13 March / Trend corr A. Badalova/ The oil prices have set new records. The oil prices exceeded $110/barrel this weak. The price of deals with futures Light Sweet totalled $109.92/barrel. The sharp price rise is necessitated by the drop in value of dollar, as compared to the other currencies.
According to Andrew Reed, the expert for oil market of the U.S. Energy Securities Analysis (ESAI), the on-going increase in oil prices is unstable.
"The market forces of supply and demand do not support increased oil prices. Therefore, I do not believe that the current upward trend in prices is sustainable," Reed told Trend on 13 March.
The increase in oil prices is driven by financial markets, the American expert said. This week dollar dipped at its record minimum - $1.5586/€1 on 13 March.
Doug MacIntyre, Senior Oil Market Analyst of the U.S. Energy Information Administration, said to Trend that looking beyond the first half of 2008, EIA projects that the surplus production capacity will grow and prices may ease, reflecting the slower consumption growth, fairly flat OPEC crude oil production. "According to the analyst, there is also significant downside price potential if there is a larger-than-expected slowdown in the world economy leading to lower oil consumption growth, than is currently expected," he said.
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