Peter Nurse   

Investing.com — After OPEC+’s modest global increase, oil prices fell on Thursday. 

Futures were trading 0.7% less at $87.64 per barrel by 9:25 ET (1450 GMT), while contract prices fell 0.6%, to $88.91. 

U.S. The price of gasoline RBOB Futures was down 1%, at $2.5815 a gallon.

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, along with Russia’s allies, agreed Wednesday to boost output by 400,000 barrels per hour in March. They also reaffirmed their policy of restoring the supplies that were shut down during the worst of the pandemic. 

Friday’s CFTC Commitment of Traders report showed that oil traders cut their net-long positions last week, falling back from the ten-week highs recorded over the prior week. Although the market continues to be extremely long with prices at record lows, a drop in long positions is likely due to the end of the OPEC+ Meeting.

However, data shows that many members have had difficulty meeting their portion of the announced increase.

“This has been evident for several months now, including for January,” said analysts at ING, in a note. “Preliminary numbers show that OPEC pumped 28.14MMbbls/d in January according to a Bloomberg survey. This is an increase of just 50Mbbls/d MoM, a far cry from the slightly more than 240Mbbls/d that OPEC could have increased production by.”

Oil prices have reached seven-year highs this year due to tight supply and geopolitical tensions in Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Eastern Europe.

Helping put a floor under today’s drop were forecasts of cold weather in central United States and parts of the Northeast this week, while U.S. crude stockpiles fell by one million barrels last week, according to the U.S. , indicating strong domestic demand.

Shell (LON 🙂 increased its share repurchases as well as dividends after strong profits in the fourth quarter, which was boosted by high oil and gas prices.