The onus for restoring the oil price back to an equilibrium lies squarely on the shoulders of countries like the U.S. and not on the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), a top Goldman Sachs analyst told CNBC.

Michele Della Vigna, head of European energy research at Goldman Sachs, said non-OPEC oil producers had created the oversupply in the market which has weighed on prices.

"I think the market has realized that where we need to find the adjustment is onshore U.S. and that's where the market is focused," he told CNBC Thursday.

"The adjustment is starting to happen there. Clearly an OPEC cut would help getting to the equilibrium faster, but at the end of the day, it is non-OPEC that needs to sort out the oversupply that it has created."



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Weak global demand and booming U.S. shale oil production are seen as two key reasons behind oil's price plunge, which has fallen around 50 percent since mid-June last year. OPEC's reluctance to cut its output at its last meeting in November has also weighed on the commodity.

OPEC, a group of 12 major oil producers which accounts for 40 percent of the world's crude oil output, has continually iterated that the organization has no intention to meet again until June. But Della Vigna said he believes a cut in production at this meeting is even less likely than at November's talks.

OPEC countries are able to extract oil from the ground at a cheaper cost than U.S. shale firms, and there has been speculation that the two industries could be playing a "game of chicken" before cutting back to ease oversupply.

So far, the U.S. has bared the brunt of the cut in production, with data from the EIA (Energy Information Administration) Wednesday showing a fall in the amount of rigs that are in operation and a drop in U.S. output for the first time since late December.

This helped snap a three-day losing streak for oil, with gains of around $2. But the commodity edged lower again on Thursday morning, with West Texas Intermediate (WTI) futures falling 0.13 percent to 49.95 a barrel by 9:00 a.m. London time, and Brent crude futures falling 0.2 percent to $56.91 a barrel.

Negotiations over Iran's nuclear deal have also dented the price of oil over recent days, as talks overran a self-imposed deadline.