Encouraging Sign As OPEC Deal Pushes Oil Prices Over $50

Since the economic downturn in our area rocked our local economy, the magic number of 50 dollars has come up over and over again from oil company operators. $50 seems to be the line at which oil companies in our area either make a profit or take a loss. If money is being made, people still have jobs. That is what we are hoping to get back to.

Well, a deal announced today at by members of OPEC at a summit in the middle east points to an increase to at least $50 per barrel.

From oil industry trade magazine oilprice.com:

Algeria hosted last week a meeting of the OPEC producers, which, against most odds and expectations, managed to reach a deal, to make a deal to cut production in the future by some 700,000 barrels per day to a production band of between 32.5 million bpd and 33 million bpd.

“We will evaluate the market in Vienna by the end of November and if 700,000 barrels are not enough, we will go up. Now that OPEC is unified and speaks in one voice everything is much easier and if we need to cut by 1 percent, we will cut by 1 percent,” Bouterfa told Ennahar, as reported by Reuters.

Ennahar TV tweeted on Thursday that Bouterfa had also said that OPEC and non-OPEC producers would meet in Istanbul on October 8-13.

CNN Money is also reporting on the change, saying:

"prices of oil have surged 12% since OPEC surprised the world last week in Algeria by reaching an understanding to cut output for the first time in eight years. The framework deal could still collapse and awaits formal approval at OPEC's regular meeting in November, but it represents a reversal from the cartel's recent strategy of flooding the world with oil."