Aramco: Oil Market Balance by H1 2017

The global oil market should be balanced early next year, the president of Saudi Aramco said on Tuesday, after oversupply drove prices to multi-year lows in 2016. "The gap between supply and demand is closing," Amin Nasser told an international energy forum, AFP reported. He said the state oil company's analysis sees the market "balanced by the first half of 2017". Last week, the chief of International Energy Agency said the market would rebalance earlier than expected if major crude producers implement a deal to cap output when they meet next month. "Under the current conditions, the IEA expects global output to exceed demand until the second half of 2017," Fatih Birol said in Singapore. But he said that if OPEC and non-OPEC producers intervene in the markets, "this rebalance can be earlier than the second half of 2017". In a surprise move, members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries led by Saudi Arabia agreed in September on a deal to trim production.