Baku, Azerbaijan, May 2
By Leman Zeynalova – Trend:
Oil prices are going down on May 2 as the volume of output in Libya has reached the highest level since 2014.
The price of Brent crude oil has decreased by 0.25 percent to $51.39 per barrel as of 05:38 (GMT +4). The price of West Texas Intermediate (WTI) has dropped by 0.37 percent and stood at $48.66 per barrel.
Libya's National Oil Corporation (NOC) said the output has risen above 760,000 barrels per day to its highest since December 2014, with plans to keep boosting production.
Earlier, NOC chairman Mustafa Sanalla said that Libya plans to bring its oil production to 1.1 million barrels per day by August 2017.
Alongside with Iran and Nigeria, Libya was exempt from the OPEC oil output cut deal reached in late 2016 in Vienna.
In December 2016, OPEC and non-OPEC producers reached their first deal since 2001 to curtail oil output jointly and ease a global glut after more than two years of low prices.
Non-OPEC oil producers such as Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Brunei, Equatorial Guinea, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Mexico, Oman, Russia, Sudan, and South Sudan agreed to reduce output by 558,000 bpd starting from Jan. 1, 2017 for six months, extendable for another six months, to take into account prevailing market conditions and prospects.
OPEC agreed to slash the output by 1.2 million barrels per day from Jan. 1, with top exporter Saudi Arabia cutting as much as 486,000 bpd.
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