OPEC Declines in February Despite Huge Iran Increase

All charts are through February 2016

The OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report just came out. The charts are “Crude Only” production and do not reflect condensate production.

Also the charts, except for Libya, are not zero based. I chose to amplify the change rather than the total. OPEC is now 13 nations with the the addition of Indonesia.

All Data is in thousand barrels per day.

OPEC 13

OPEC production was down 174,800 barrels per day in February Read More

A Closer Look at OPEC

Taking a closer look at OPEC. All OPEC and price data below is through December. All production data is in thousand barrels per day.

Iran and Libya have had serious political disruptions in their production numbers. Simply adding them to the OPEC numbers distorts the picture. To try to figure out what has been happening to OPEC we need to look at OPEC without Iran and Libya.

OPEC Less Iran and Libya

Here is OPEC less Iran and Libya, or the OPEC 10 if you will. I have marked August 2012 as what I call the “Price Peak”. Not the peak in oil prices but the production peak that was brought about by the increase in the price of oil. That price increase began in early 2009 and by March 2011 was well above $100 a barrel. And the price of oil did not drop below $100 a barrel until late August 2014.

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OPEC, except for Iran, Has Peaked

The OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report is out. OPEC took a hit in December, down 205,000 barrels per day. After examining the past and present production numbers, I believe that OPEC, except Iran, has peaked. That is, the combined production from all the other OPEC nations, has peaked. And any additional production from Libya is likely to be in tiny increments that won’t make much difference in the big picture. Other OPEC nations may show a slight increase from their current level. But the combined production from all the other 11 OPEC nations, 12 if you count Indonesia, has peaked.

Of course there will be some small increases from the other 11 OPEC countries from time to time but overall, in 2016 and beyond, I believe it will OPEC will be from flat to down, with a greater chance of being down. That is we are at, or near, the peak right now. There might be a slight uptick of their combined production in the coming months but not enough to get excited abut.

All Data in the charts below is through December and is in thousand barrels per day.

OPEC 12

OPEC production, in the chart above does not include Indonesia. OPEC 12 was down 204,000 barrels per day.

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OPEC Crude Little Change

The OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report is just out  with the crude only production numbers for the 12 OPEC countries. The data below is in thousand barrels per day and the last data point is September 2015.

OPEC 12

OPEC 12 crude only production was up 109,000 barrels per day in September but that was after the August production numbers were revised down by 82,000 bpd. OPEC crude only production now stands at 31,571,000 pbd. That is just 12,000 bpd above June production but still 100,000 bpd below their peak in July of 2008.

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