SINGAPORE: Oil prices on Wednesday slipped away from two-and-a-half year highs hit the previous session as the gradual resumption of flows through a major North Sea pipeline made up for supply disruption in Libya. But the two outages in quick succession have highlighted how much tighter global oil markets have become a year into supply cuts led by OPEC and Russia. The dips were a result of the gradual return of the 450,000 barrels per day (bpd) capacity Forties pipeline system in the North Sea. “The Saudi budget and Libyan attack on a pipeline have driven prices sharply higher,” said Greg McKenna, chief market strategist at futures brokerage AxiTrader. A major factor countering efforts by OPEC and Russia efforts to prop up prices is US oil production, which has soared more than 16 percent since mid-2016 and is fast approaching 10 million bpd.

Source: Libya Today December 27, 2017 02:37 UTC