By Adedapo Adesanya
Oil prices declined on Monday following Saudi Arabia’s Aramco return to full production capacity that was lost to the attacks on Saudi oil facilities earlier in September.
Business Post reports that at the global market yesterday, the Brent Crude oil price traded below $60 per barrel after going down $1.56 or 2.56 percent to exchange at $59.48 per barrel.
For the US oil, the West Texas Intermediate (WTI) Crude, it also fell further below $55 as it lost $1.62 or 2.9 percent to trade at $54.29 per barrel.
This followed as a disclosure by Aramco Trading’s Chief Executive Officer Ibrahim al-Buainain, who said that state-owned Saudi Aramco restored full output capacity on September 25, to the level before the September 14 attacks on Saudi facilities.
Mr al-Buainain hinted that the production had been restored to its target of 9.9 million barrels per day and noted that it might have been higher than that.
The attacks on the Saudi facilities, which the United States and Saudi Arabia have blamed on Iran, had led to the loss of more than 5 million barrels a day of Saudi crude production which drove prices up by almost 20 percent.
Oil prices may continue to drop as Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, said in an interview broadcast on Sunday he would prefer a political solution to a military one in response to attacks.
However, Business Post reported last week that Aramco’s production had returned to 9.8 million barrels per day, which is about the same level it was at before the attacks.
Analysts weighing the oil market noted that Brent scored a 0.6 percent monthly climb, but ended down 8.7 percent for the quarter while the WTI recorded a 1.9 percent monthly decline, and lost 7.5 percent for the quarter based on front month contract prices.
Dipo Olowookere