Oil-market analysts don’t expect the Organization of the Exporting Countries and its allies on Wednesday to agree to sharply boost production in September — but members could take steps that serve to incrementally bolster supply. “In my opinion, there is a chance that OPEC+ puts out a plan that would raise production for the entire group, eliminating individual quotas for member states,” said Robert Yawger, executive director for energy futures at Mizuho, in a note.
Eliminating quotas would allow countries with spare capacity — the Gulf states of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Kuwait — to increase production, at the expense of producers pumping below quota, such as Nigeria, Algeria, and Angola, Yawger said. Such an outcome would also cater to U.S. President Joe Biden’s plea to the producer group to increase output, giving Biden room to claim that his July trip to Saudi Arabia wasn’t in vain, he said. Biden traveled to Saudi Arabia last month, greeting Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman with a fist bump after having promised to treat the kingdom as a “pariah” during his 2020 presidential campaign. The White House in 2021 cleared the release of an intelligence …