Russia cuts oil production

During the first decade of January, Russian oil companies reduced oil production by 100,000 barrels per day. This is the third part of what is expected in connection with the agreement with OPEC.

OPEC countries on November 30 agreed to cut production by 1.2 million barrels per day - to 32.5 million barrels. Cutting production should help raise raw material prices.

Eleven countries outside OPEC also agreed on measures to raise oil prices in December. They pledged to cut total production by 558,000 barrels per day, including Russia by 300,000 barrels.

Currently, Russia has cut production by only a third of the planned size due to the fact that it is "technically" impossible to quickly cut production volumes.

However, analysts believe this slow pace of production cuts is driven primarily by the Russians seeing what other big producers are doing. In the past, the countries of the cartel did not comply with the restrictions and often tried to take advantage of the situation to sell their own oil.