The United Arab Emirates' exit from OPEC this week will weaken the influence of the cartel and its leader Saudi Arabia on the oil market, a development that could prove bearish for prices over the long term. The UAE was the most influential member of OPEC behind Saudi Arabia. It was one of the few members, along with Saudi Arabia, that had meaningful spare production capacity to influence prices and respond to supply shocks, said Jorge León, head of geopolitical analysis at Rystad Energy.Spare capacity is t ...

The OPEC+ group continues to return modest volumes of supply to the market, cautious not to sink oil prices as demand weakens after the summer. The production hikes are estimated to be lower than the headline figures suggest—some producers lack the capacity to boost output further, while others are compensating for previous overproduction. While the lower-than-planned production increases support oil prices, they also reduce the spare capacity of the OPEC+ producers. Not that many of them have any meaning ...