Is Opec changing tack after market share drive?

A SEA change has come over the market since oil prices began to slide in mid-June two years ago. After wiping out three-fourths of oil values, crude has recovered nearly a quarter this year.

Conversations have shifted to a quicker market rebalancing. The International Energy Agency (IEA), which worried in January that the market "could be drowning in oversupply", and the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) all see the market in balance next year.

Saudi Arabia, which championed output as an Opec strategy, contends that oversupplies are ending. "We are out of it, the oversupply has disappeared," its energy minister, Khalid Al Falih, told Houston Chronicle recently.

Instead, Opec is among those voicing concern about falling upstream investment and long-term price stability. Investments, which plunged by US$160 billion last year, could drop by a third this year, a BP annual energy survey …