OPEC and Russia to Tackle Oil Price Slump amid the Coronavirus Outbreak

OPEC and the allies, including Russia, are scheduled to have a meeting on 5 – 6 March, but with the unpredicted outbreak of coronavirus, those oil-producing countries might meet earlier to discuss on the matter of the oil price dropped amid the epidemic.

The virus not only has an effect on human, but also hit on the oil price as in oil consumption demand in China has declined since the outbreak. Oil has plunged 21.4% from the early January when Iran launched rockets at U.S. military bases in Iraq.

Even the oil market expected an improving on global market following the Sino-US phase one trading deal, but the economy was hurt again by a pneumonia disease.

West Texas Intermediate was at $51.59 per barrel, after trading as high as $65.65 in early January.

OPEC would gather urgency to discuss about the possibility to expand the oil output cut till at least June from March. The outbreak in China has reduced the demand by more than 250,000 barrels per day and drag on oil price.

OPEC and its allies have been deducting oil production since last December.

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said “We can meet earlier, this is not a problem at all,”, “We have discussed it with the Saudi (energy) minister several times already … Yesterday, we spoke for an hour, today for half an hour. We are discussing it very seriously,” Interfax quoted Novak as saying.

“In principle, we are ready to quickly react to such things. We need to assess the situation and continue to monitor for a few more days,” he added.