Venezuela minister warns oil prices may collapse if producers don't talk

[MOSCOW] Venezuelan Oil Minister Eulogio Del Pino warned on Wednesday that global oil stocks were nearly full and the oil price could collapse if producers did not resume talks about freezing output levels.

He said oil inventories were 90 per cent full, while producers continue to produce about 1.5-2.0 million barrels per day of oil more than the market demands.

Del Pino was speaking at an oil conference in Moscow, just days after leading oil producers failed to reach an agreement on freezing their output levels in order to help support weak oil prices.

The minister said a price of US$60-70 per barrel was required to allow producers to resume investing in new fields to replace declining mature fields.

REUTERS