OPEC to trim down output from February

The proposal - which still has to be formally approved by the oil ministers of the 11-nation Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries later in the day - was meant to bridge differences between members who favored immediate cuts and those who supported the status quo, APA reports.

"I don't think a cut would be implemented" now, said Libyan oil minister before Thursday ministerial meeting. "I back the deferred cut."

Delegates said Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and other leading oil producers also supported the proposal.

But price hawks Iran, Algeria and Venezuela had remained firm on the need for reductions now.

Any new cut would come on the heels of a 1.2 million barrel-a-day reduction agreed to in October that, however, has not been fully implemented. The International Energy Agency - the developing world’s energy watchdog - says OPEC now produces about 780,000 barrels less than before the October decision to cut back.

The agency said that total OPEC daily output in November was 28.9 million barrels. With the exclusion of Iraq, which is exempt from quotas, the group produced 27.1 million barrels a day.

Major factor at the meeting is the level of oil inventories in the U.S. and other large consuming nations. Because of lower-than-expected refinery operations, U.S. crude oil inventories stood at 335.4 million barrels last week, 4.3 million barrel drop from the previous week but still 4 percent more than last year.

The IEA said in its monthly report that stockpiles of crude in industrialized nations fell by 40 million barrels in October, APA reports.