The United States does not exclude any possible measures in response to the decision of oil exporting countries to reduce production, in particular, new releases of oil from US reserves are being considered.
It is reported by the Financial Times.
The White House said it is considering possible responses to cuts in oil supplies from OPEC+ countries, in particular new releases from the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve to curb energy prices.
On Wednesday, key OPEC+ ministers agreed to cut oil production by 2 million barrels per day. This is the biggest cut in oil production since the COVID pandemic in 2020. The press release clarified that the 2 million b/d reduction would come from quotas and not actual production. Given the proportion of quotas and their fulfillment in September, the decline will be less than 1 million b/d (Bloomberg estimates, 880 thousand b/d).
Brian Deese, director of the White House’s National Economic Council, called the OPEC+ decision to cut production “unnecessary and unjustified” and said the US was considering selling further from its strategic reserves, which had already fallen by more than 200 million barrels last year.
He also did not rule out imposing a ban or restriction on the export of gasoline and other petroleum products, when journalists asked if such an idea was being considered. “The President gave us an instruction, and it remains unchanged – not to rule out any solution,” Dees said.