Submitted by Nick Cunningham via OilPrice.com,
If anyone is cheering the news of an OPEC deal it is U.S. shale producers. The OPEC agreement sent oil prices shooting up this week, with WTI and Brent quickly surging above $50 per barrel.
Going into the Algiers OPEC meeting in late September, the prevailing sentiment among the analyst community was that there is no way any deal will get done: after all there was no secret that the recent animosity between Iran and Saudi Arabia had recent reached unprecedented levels, with both side directly involved across from each other in the Syrian proxy war.
However, the deal did happened, surprising virtually everyone, and based on a new Reuters report, it was thanks to one man.
Defying numerous skeptics, today's historic OPEC decision to cut production, a first since 2009, marks a clear turning point in cartel, and especially Saudi Arabian, politics: individual country quotas have been allocated to all members, a third-party production verification process has been established, and the world’s largest crude oil producer Russia has committed to freeze production.At least, that's what the deal looks like on paper.
For those who missed today's fireworks, which saw oil soar as much as 10%, here are the key details.
Today's "OPEC deal" snowjob continued with the statement by Russian energy minister Novak, who moments ago have a press conference in which he praised the production cut conclusion, however, two key aspects of Russia's contribution to the non-OPEC stood out.