Oil prices eased on Thursday after OPEC and allies such as Russia agreed to taper record supply curbs from August, though the drop was cushioned by hopes for a swift U.S. demand pick-up after a big drawdown from the country’s crude stocks, Reuters reports.

Brent crude LCOc1 fell 27 cents, or 0.6%, to $43.52 a barrel by 0439 GMT, and U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude CLc1 dropped 32 cents, or 0.8%, to $40.88 a barrel. They rose 2% the previous day, helped by the U.S. crude inventories drop.

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its allies, known as OPEC+, agreed on Wednesday to scale back oil production cuts from August as the global economy slowly recovers from the coronavirus pandemic.

OPEC+ has been cutting output since May by 9.7 million barrels per day, or 10% of global supply, but from August, cuts will officially taper to 7.7 million bpd until December.

Despite the official OPEC+ accord, Saudi Arabian Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman said production cuts in August and September would end up amounting to about 8.1 million-8.3 million bpd, more than the headline number. That’s because countries in the grouping which over-produced earlier this year would compensate by making extra August-September cuts, the minister said.

News.Az