Oil slips on record Saudi output; markets eye G20 and OPEC meetings

Agencies

November 27, 2018

Singapore, Nov 27: Oil slipped on Tuesday, pulled down by record Saudi Arabian production even as OPEC's top producer pushes for supply cuts ahead of the group's meeting in Austria next week.

International Brent crude oil futures (LCOc1) briefly dipped below $60 per barrel before rising back to $60.33 at 0520 GMT, down 15 cents, or 0.3 percent, from their last close.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures (CLc1) were at $51.33 per barrel, down 30 cents, or 0.6 percent.

Saudi Arabia raised oil production to an all-time high in November, an industry source said on Monday, pumping 11.1 million to 11.3 million barrels per day (bpd) during the month.

Oil prices have lost almost a third of their value since early October, weighed down by an emerging supply overhang and widespread financial market weakness.

"The oil price correction has become a rout of historic proportions," U.S. investment bank Jefferies said in a note on Tuesday.

"The negative price reaction is as severe as the 2008 financial crisis and the aftermath of the November 2015 OPEC meeting, when the group decided not to act in the face of a very over-supplied market," it added.

Norbert Ruecker, head of commodity research at Swiss bank Julius Baer, said the weak sentiment "follows a surprisingly swift and pronounced change in the market mood from shortage fears to glut concerns," while the world economy was also slowing down.

Traders said they were awaiting the outcome of the Group of 20 (G20) meeting in Buenos Aires and also the result of a meeting of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).

The leaders of the G20 countries, which make up the world's biggest economies, meet on Nov. 30 and Dec. 1, with the trade war between Washington and Beijing atop the agenda. But with top crude producers Russia, the United States and Saudi Arabia all present, oil policy is also expected to be discussed.

The G20 meeting will be followed by OPEC's annual meeting at its headquarters in Vienna on Dec. 6, when the producer cartel will discuss its output policy together with some non-OPEC producers, including Russia.

Saudi Arabia has been pushing for an OPEC cut, indicating it may reduce supply by 500,000 bpd.

"If this is from a November level of 11 million bpd, it is not particularly heroic," Jefferies said.

In favour of low oil prices for consumers, U.S. President Donald Trump has put pressure on his political ally Saudi Arabia, OPEC's de-facto leader, not to cut production.

Despite this, most analysts expect OPEC to start withholding some supply soon.

"We suspect that producers will start to withhold exports in the coming months, putting a floor under prices," said Capital Economics in a note, adding that it expected Brent to be around $60 per barrel by end-2019.

Fereidun Fesharaki, chairman of energy consultancy FGE, warned that a failure by OPEC and Russia to significantly cut supply would mean crude prices would "fall further, perhaps to Brent at $50 per barrel and WTI of $40 per barrel or less."

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Israeli forces invade southwestern Syria, set up checkpoint in Quneitra

News Network

November 24,2025

Israeli forces have pushed over the Syrian frontier, erecting a checkpoint and stopping vehicles in the southwestern city of Quneitra, in yet another breach of the Arab country’s sovereignty.

The violation took place on Sunday, when the troops made their way across the border, setting up the outpost near the Ain al-Bayda junction in northern Quneitra, Syrian outlets reported.

According to the al-Ikhbariya paper, an Israeli detachment positioned itself at the junction, halting cars and conducting searches.

The Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) reported that three Israeli military vehicles then moved further into the northern countryside, deploying between the town of Jubata al-Khashab and the villages of Ofaniya and Ain al-Bayda. The agency added that a separate Israeli unit mounted a new incursion in the central region, approaching the villages of Umm Batina and al-Ajraf.

Residents said such activities have surged in recent months, pointing to Israeli advances onto farmland, leveling of extensive forested areas, arrests, and spread of mobile checkpoints.

The Israeli regime began markedly increasing its military aggression against Syria last year.

The escalation coincided with increasingly ferocious onslaughts throughout the country by the so-called Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) Takfiri terrorist group, which the government of President Bashar al-Assad had confined to northwestern Syria. The HTS, however, managed to overthrow the government as the Israeli attacks would pummel the country’s civilian and defensive infrastructure.

Various reports have shown that, during the escalation, the regime conducted more than 1,000 airstrikes on the Syrian territory and over 400 ground raids into the south.

Following the collapse of the Assad government, Tel Aviv also widened its grip over the occupied Golan Heights by taking control of a demilitarized buffer zone, in defiance of a 1974 Disengagement Agreement. Earlier this month, senior Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, visited the buffer zone, prompting expressions of alarm on the part of the United Nations.

The United States, the regime’s biggest ally, has, meanwhile, been fraternizing the HTS head Abu Mohammed al-Jolani amid the widely reported prospect of rapprochement with Tel Aviv.

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