Price Of Oil Goes Below $100 Before OPEC Meeting

In Asia on Wednesday, prices of oil went below $100 per barrel between expectations that the Organization Of Petroleum Exporting Countries will not touch its quotas and leave them unchanged.

January delivery’s benchmark crude declined by 29 cents, to finish at a value of $99.85 per barrel during mid day in Singapore at the New York Mercantile Exchange during electronic trading. The contract for benchmark crude increased by $2.37 as it settled at a value of $100.14 per barrel on Tuesday.

On the ICE futures exchange in London, Brent crude dropped by 16 cents to finish at a value of $109.34.

Later on Wednesday, OPEC will be meeting in Vienna at a time when the global economy is already slowing down and is jeopardized by increased energy costs. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, which comprises of a total 12 nations, will also be looking to avert a supply glut as the oil exports of Libya gradually get on the pathway of recovery next year.

On the other hand, in the United States, statistics reveal that energy supplies remained more or less unchanged. According to the American Petroleum Institute, which revealed on late Tuesday that in the past week, there was a 462,000 increase in crude inventories however according to the expectations of analysts, which were surveyed by McGraw Hill Cos’s energy information arm, Platts, the inventories were to drop by 2 million barrels.

In the past week, gasoline inventories dropped by 12,000 barrels whereas there was a 1.2 million barrels increase in distillates.

During other Nymex trading, 2 cents drop was recorded in natural gas, as it settled at a value of $3.23 per 1000 cubic feet, whereas heating oil dropped by 0.5 cents to finish at a value of $2.92 per gallon. Moreover, futures of gasoline dropped by 0.8 cents to finish at a value of $2.62 per gallon.