Oil prices see slight rise ahead of OPEC+ meeting

By Gulsen Cagatay

ANKARA (AA) - Crude oil was trading with some gains just before the meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its allies in Vienna on Thursday.

Brent crude was trading at $52.08 per barrel at 0700 GMT on Thursday for a 0.93% gain while American benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) was trading at $45.35 a barrel at the same time.

The international benchmark hit as low as $53.95 per barrel earlier Tuesday, marking its lowest level since Jan. 3, 2019, according to official data.

The outbreak of the coronavirus continues to sustain low crude demand worldwide and a downward pressure on oil prices. However, OPEC and its allies are expected to make an additional oil production cut of 1 million barrels per day (bpd) this week to help raise crude oil prices.

The 178th extraordinary meeting of the OPEC conference will start on Thursday at 0830 GMT as the ministers of OPEC member states will convene to discuss how much each country can further cut their respective production.

The 8th OPEC and non-OPEC ministerial meeting will kick off on Friday at 0830 GMT as non-OPEC countries led by Russia will meet to discuss how they can participate in OPEC's production cut.

While OPEC is expected to make at least a 600,000-barrel-per-day (bpd) additional production cut, the majority of this OPEC heavyweight Saudi Arabia is anticipated to typically carry out.

Meanwhile on Wednesday, data released by the Energy Information Administration (EIA) showed that U.S. commercial crude oil inventories rose by 0.8 million barrels, or 0.2%, to 444.1 million barrels for the week ending Feb. 28. This was less than the market expectation of an increase of 2.6 million barrels. Crude inventories increased by 0.5 million barrels during the previous week.