RIYADH: Oil prices fell on Wednesday, taking a breather from a nearly 4 percent surge the previous day, on receding fears of an imminent output cut by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies, a group known as OPEC+.
Global benchmark Brent crude futures fell 40 cents, or 0.4 percent, to $99.82 a barrel by 0337 GMT, after rising 3.9 percent on Tuesday.
The US West Texas Intermediate crude futures contract was down 27 cents, or 0.29 percent, at $93.47 a barrel, having jumped 3.7 percent the previous day.
Potential OPEC+ production cuts may not be imminent and are likely to coincide with the return of Iran to oil markets should that country clinch a nuclear deal with the West, nine OPEC sources told Reuters on Tuesday.
Peru’s $4.5 billion lawsuit against Repsol over oil spill to go to court
A Peruvian judge on Tuesday admitted a $4.5 billion lawsuit against Spanish oil firm Repsol, eight months after an underwater oil pipeline owned by the company caused a spill of over 10,000 barrels into the Pacific Ocean.
The civil lawsuit seeking $3 billion for environmental damage and $1.5 billion for damages to locals and consumers was filed by Peru’s consumer protection agency Indecopi.
Repsol has said the lawsuit is meritless, the sum demanded is arbitrary, and that the spill was not its fault.
The proceedings, however, add to Repsol’s legal troubles. The company is also facing a criminal investigation over the spill and prosecutors have barred four top executives from leaving the country for 18 months.
Peru has called the incident the country’s worst environmental disaster in recent memory.
Repsol said in May that cleanup of the spill would cost it $150 million.
Pemex fined for failures at top oil field leading to flaring
Mexico’s hydrocarbon regulator has fined state oil company Petroleos Mexicanos, also known as Pemex, for development violations at one of its most important fields that led to excessive flaring of natural gas, and is preparing another fine for a similar field, according to three sources briefed on the matter.
The Comision Nacional de Hidrocarburos, as the regulator is known, in recent weeks fined Pemex more than 40 million Mexican pesos ($1.98 million) for violating its own development plans at the Ixachi field in Veracruz state, two of the sources said.
Such fines are capped by the Mexican hydrocarbon law but one of the sources said it was the highest so far imposed.
Pemex lawyers have already filed an appeal over the Ixachi fine, which is now being considered by a judge, the two sources said, adding that it could result in a lengthy legal process.
(With input from Reuters)
