Spot price for Saudi light oil drops

Press, 15 July 1982, Page 9

Spot price for Saudi light oil drops

NZPA London Traders in the free crude oil market had reduced the spot price of Saudi Arabian light crude about USBOc (SNZI.OB) a barrel after O.P.E.C.’s abortive week-end meeting and threats of a cut in official Saudi contract prices, oil industry sources said yesterday. After the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries failed to set agreed output quotas to underpin prices, several Oil Ministers did not rule out a reduction in the Saudi long-term contract price-of SUS 34 ($45.9).

The Saudis said they would monitor the market before deciding anything. Industry sources said noncontract Arab light was

quoted vesterdav around $U531.20 ’(s42.ol)’a barrel, down from SUS 32 ($43.02) before O.P.E.C. met in Vienna. The Venzuelan Oil Minister (Dr Humberto Calderon Berti) was quoted by Venezuelan reporters yesterday as saying that he guaranteed that no Saudi decision had yet been made.

He said that six O.P.E.C. members — Kuwait, Algeria, Indonesia, Ecuador, the United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela — had met after the O.P.E.C. meeting and had continued in daily contact to draw up • a stratgegy for defending O.P.E.C. prices. These are now aligned on SUS 34 ($45 09) for Saudi light, used as a reference price.