By KUNA
Tokyo : The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries’ (OPEC) decision to keep oil production quotas unchanged will have a limited effect on crude prices, Head of the Petroleum Association of Japan said Thursday. “The decision paid a certain consideration for oil-consuming nations, but the markets have already taken it into account. Therefore, it is unlikely to have a significant impact on the prices,” Fumiaki Watari, president of the Petroleum Association of Japan, said in a statement. The official noted that some OPEC members demanded a reduction in output.
Japan is the world’s third-biggest oil importer after the US and China, and the largest buyer of Kuwait’s crude.
Amid historic surges in crude prices, the OPEC decided in Vienna on Wednesday to maintain oil production quotas in and after April unchanged at 29.
67 million barrels per day for its 12 members, excluding Iraq.
Watari also said the current pace of price hikes is likely to last in light of outside factors, such as the recent global downturn in stocks and the US dollar’s downward trend, which will promote an inflow of speculative money into crude futures.
New York oil prices hit an all-time high of USD 104.95 a barrel on Wednesday after the world’s biggest bloc of oil producers agreed to keep production unchanged.