OPEC Announces Cut In Production: Reasons Are Very, Very Dubious

Bloomberg is reporting. The headline suggests that Bloomberg is very suspicious of reasons provided by OPEC for cut in production. This is not rocket science.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries will cut crude shipments next month as global refinery maintenance peaks, according to tanker tracker Oil Movements.

The group that supplies about 40 percent of the world’s oil will reduce crude exports by about 120,000 barrels a day, or 0.5 percent, to 23.7 million a day in the four weeks to April 20, the researcher said today in an e-mailed report. The figures exclude Angola and Ecuador.

“Refiner crude demand is lower right now,” Roy Mason, the company’s founder, said by phone from Halifax, England. “It reaches a seasonal low in April.”

In medicine, the most un-useful bit of information: when the cause of death was reported as "cardio-respiratory arrest."

In the oil industry, the most un-useful bit of information: when OPEC tells us they will be cutting back production because refineries are using less.