Saudi Arabia is ready for more production cuts if necessary

Saudi Arabia is ready to cut oil production further if necessary when OPEC+ meets again in June, said Kingdom Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman Al Saud.

“Flexibility and pragmatism will allow us to continue to take more (cuts) if necessary”, said Abdulaziz bin Salman Al Saud during a conference call Monday. “We have to watch what happens with the destruction of demand or the improvement of demand, depending on how things develop”, he further emphasized.

Saudi Arabia, Russia, and other OPEC+ oil producers sign a historic deal on Sunday (April 12th) to cut overall production by 9.7 million barrels per day, about 10-tenths of global supply, in an attempt to stabilize a market devastated by the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

“We are still dealing with the uncertainty surrounding the virus and its impact”, the Saudi energy minister said.

Saudi Arabia would only cut off its output if other OPEC+ countries also decided to cut production, Bin Salman stressed. However, he cautioned that softer oil demand collapses may prove too pessimistic and, therefore, OPEC+ may not need to further reduce production.