TEHRAN (FNA)- Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said that the market is facing reduction in supply and no producer is able to make up for the loss.
"At present, the oil market is facing reduction in supply and is not balanced," Zanganeh told reporters in Tehran on Tuesday.
"At present, no producer has the needed possibility and power to increase production," he added.
Zanganeh explained that Saudi Arabia is now using its oil reserves while the US has announced that it will not use its reserves until ambiguities about the fate of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi are cleared.
He noted that US President Donald Trump thinks that he can decrease oil prices through bullying oil producers, and said the shortage in the crude market will not disappear by words.
In relevant remarks last week, Zanganeh dismissed Saudi officials' claims that the country could compensate for a loss of Tehran's supplies in the global market after the imposition of the US sanctions.
"These remarks seem to have been made under the pressure exerted by Mr. Trump, otherwise, in reality, neither Saudi Arabia nor any other producer is capable of such production," Zanganeh said in response to the Saudi officials who claimed that they can export two barrels of oil for any single barrel of Iranian crude lost by the market after the US sanctions.
He added that the tight market situation and price hikes indicated that the market was already facing a shortage, adding that the market was right to be concerned about the future.
"The oil that Saudi Arabia presented to the market recently was not its excessive production but was its past reserves," Zanganeh disclosed.
Poster Comment:
So, looks like oil/gasoline price will keep increasing.