OPEC Keeps the Deal Alive and Shale’s Dreams Too

The 172nd Meeting of the OPEC Conference and 2nd OPEC and non-OPEC Ministerial Meeting Vienna, Austria, 25th May, 2017

This Meeting was extremely important for OPEC and the Austrian authorities too, who were naturally very mindful of the atrocious terrorist attack in Manchester this week and others elsewhere beforehand.

Security had been stepped up to the highest level in years. It has always been in place for OPEC Meetings, but this time there was a greater awareness of the threat, with Ministers from twenty-four countries and market followers from around the world attending a series of meeting over the last few days.

During the opening address, HE Khalid A. Al-Falih, the Saudi Arabian Minister and Conference President announced that the market had moved towards balancing since the last Meeting in November, but that there was more work to do in terms of reducing inventories. International Oil Companies were publishing improved results and investment was returning to the upstream sector. He was optimistic about the future, expecting higher global GDP with healthy oil demand growth particularly from Asia, where most of OPEC’s business now lies. He was also very positive about the agreement between OPEC and non-OPEC producers.

John Hall

John joined Alfa Energy in 2013 as Chairman, where his specific interest is the development of the company’s profile in the areas in which it primarily operates - across the EU and the US. He is Fellow of the Energy Institute, a Member of the Parliamentary Group for Energy Studies, an Associate Member of the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply, and a Member of the Market Research Society. He began his long career in the industry when he set up John Hall Associates in 1973, a company which merged with Energy Quote in 2009 and currently trades as Energy Quote JHA.

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