By Gina Lee

Investing.com – Oil was up Wednesday morning in Asia, clawing back some losses over expectations that the and allies (OPEC+) will restrain oil supply during a two-day meeting.

By 10:37 ET (03:37 GMT), the price had risen 2.33%, to $70.84 The price of $67.63 rose by 2.19%, falling below $70.

OPEC+ and OPEC+ are expected to meet in the afternoon. OPEC+ follows a day afterwards. The cartel is likely to halt its plans to expand supply to 400,000 barrels/day (bpd), by January 2022. Several OPEC+ ministers said that plans were not being changed after the discovery of the omicron-COVID-19 variant.

In a note, ANZ Research analysts stated that the market is still looking for any signs Omicron might have on demand.

However, even if OPEC+ accepts an increase in oil production, it could prove difficult for producers to provide more.

“The threat to oil demand is genuine. Another wave of lockdowns could result in up to 3 million bpd of oil demand lost in the first quarter of 2022,” Rystad Energy senior oil markets analyst Louise Dickson told Reuters.

Meanwhile, Tuesday’s showed a draw of 747,000 barrels for the week ending Nov. 26, lower than the 1.667-million-barrel draw in forecasts prepared by Investing.com. API reports a weekly increase of 2.303 million barrels.

Investors are now waiting for, which is due late in the afternoon.