Markets
OPEC+ Set to Hold Output as Oil Hits a Six-Month High
OPEC+ agreed in principle to keep December output targets unchanged at its online meeting on Sunday, Reuters reported. Brent's expiring contract had settled at $117.64, its highest since April.
The oil producers' alliance has decided that the price is not its problem this month. Seven core OPEC+ members, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iraq, Kuwait, Algeria, Kazakhstan and Oman, agreed in principle to leave their December production targets unchanged at an online meeting on Sunday, November 1, three sources told Reuters on Saturday. The sources said the group does not expect further changes to output policy until next year.
The decision lands with crude at its highest in six months. On Friday, October 30, Brent's December contract, which expired that day, rose $2.76, or 2.4%, to $117.64 a barrel after touching $118, the highest settlement since the end of April. The January contract, now the benchmark, gained $2.63 to $113.43, and US crude rose $2.12, or 2.08%, to $104.12 as traders prepared for an escalation in the war with Iran. The United States Oil Fund closed the week at $168.83, its highest close of the month.
Holding targets steady at these prices sounds hawkish, but the targets are not what limits supply right now. In September OPEC+ finished unwinding the 1.65 million barrels a day of voluntary cuts first agreed in 2023, and a further group-wide cut of about 2 million barrels a day covers most members through the end of 2026. Gulf producers are rebuilding exports that the war disrupted for months, and most are still pumping well below the targets they already have. Raising a ceiling that members cannot reach would add no barrels; it would only signal intent, and the group chose not to send one.
The real negotiation is about next year. Before the end of the fourth quarter OPEC+ has to finish a review of each member's production capacity, which will set the baselines for 2027. Baselines are the reference points from which quotas and cuts are measured, so a country whose assessed capacity rises gets a bigger share of any future increase. Those talks have historically been harder than any monthly decision, because they divide a fixed market among members with very different ambitions to expand.
For traders, Sunday's outcome mostly removes one source of surprise. The price of oil is being set by the war and by how fast Gulf exports recover, not by OPEC+ quotas, and a hold confirms that the group is content to let it be. The next moves to watch are the January Brent contract, which trades about $4 below the one that expired, and whether the capacity review produces baselines that reward the members with room to grow before the 2027 quotas are written.