Brent Crude Falls Nearly 3% Ahead of OPEC Ministers Meeting

The North Sea oil benchmark fell over 2.8 percent on Friday as representatives from Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and other oil producing states converged on St. Petersburg to look over the implementation of last year's oil output cut deal.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Brent fell from around $49.6 per barrel to under $48 per barrel. North American WTI also fell over 2.8 percent in Friday's trading to around $45.6 per barrel.

The OPEC technical committee meeting is due on Saturday and the Joint Ministerial Monitoring Committee (JMMC) with other oil producers will take place on July 24. Representatives from oil-producing states will track the implementation of oil production cuts agreed by OPEC members and 10 other major oil producers, including Russia.

OPEC and a number of non-cartel oil producers reached a deal in the Austrian capital of Vienna in 2016, agreeing to cut oil output by a total of 1.8 million barrels per day from October's level. The agreement was supported by 11 non-OPEC states, which promised to jointly reduce oil output by 558,000 barrels per day, with Russia pledging to cut production by 300,000 barrels daily.

The JMMC was created in order to control the implementation of the deal. It includes ministers of three OPEC member states — Venezuela, Kuwait and Algeria — and two countries that not part of the cartel, namely Russia and Oman. The JMMC meets every two months.