Wealth of oil countries

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33870, 16 June 1975, Page 11

Wealth of oil countries

AZ. Press Assn— Copyright; || NEW YORK. i; Junt 13. j The surplus revenue of the oil exporting countries, which not long : i ago caused great concern < for industrial countries,' 'will decline and may even ' become deficits in the ( ; 1980 s, according to an < analysis by the U.S. I First National City' Bank, the “New York i Tiroes” reported. The bank’s economists present four possible .scenarios on how the combined surpluses of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (0.P.E.C.) could develop between now and 1985. | All of the analyses show , a peaking of petro-dollar sur- , pluses no later than early in|j the next decade, and then a i decline, with two of the possible courses moving into i (deficit by 1985. A main point of the bank's ■ .analysis is that even its maxi- | .mum estimate of an O.P.E.C. j (surplus — about SUS29SO million — is well under the ] ■ widely prevailing forecasts of , a SUS3OOO million excess s made following the quadrupl- , ing of Oil prices in 1973-74. , The study recalls the . earlier fears that O.P.E.C. surpluses would become unmanageable and lead to a collapse of the world’s monetary system. It comments that the problem of recycling the oil revenues is well on the way to solution and that a dramatic turn-around to lower surpluses and potential deficits for some O.P.E.C countries is in prospect Two main reasons for the changed outlook are cited. They are the growth of' O.P.E.C. imports of goods and sendees at a faster rate than expected and the reduced 1 world demand for oil arising 1 'chiefly from recessionary conditions. i Senior monetary officials in ; Paris said that failure to agree on world monetary re- ( forms would probably delay j implementing new aid . schemes for developing coun- ( tries until at least the end of the vear. The officials, after two days of negotiations as nart ' of the International Monetary Fund’s (LM.F.) interim com- I mittee seeking world none-J

Itgry reform, began a two-dgy meeting of the I.M.F. s (development committee ; The interim committee o gearch ended in failure ye*iterdav due to disagreement* (between France and the jUnited States over the role of gold in the world moneitaiw system, the way the I.M.F.'s gold assets should be disposed of and over exchange rate*, with France calling for a return to fixed parities while the Americans preferred the current floating system.