OPEC Rejects Call For Oil Price Band...

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><root available-locales="en_US," default-locale="en_US"><static-content language-id="en_US"><![CDATA[Oil cartel OPEC on Monday rejected India's call for regulating crude prices through a price band, saying the market was the best judge and forecast prices climbing to $170 a barrel on summer demand in the US. &quot;Producing and consuming nations never agree on any price... They never agreed with (OPEC) price band (that operated between 2000 and 2005). Then we did away with the price band... We are never going to agree (on the price band),&quot; OPEC President Chakib Khelil told reporters on sidelines of the World Petroleum Congress in Madrid. CLICK ON Oil Muddle: Full Coverage Stung by high oil prices driving inflation to 13 year high of 11.42 per cent, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram had, at a meeting of energy ministers in Jeddah last week, asked the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to operationalise a price band mechanism wherein crude prices move within a specified range. The speculative premium has been put by New Delhi at $60 a barrel. Khelil, however, said, &quot;We (should) let the oil market decide.&quot; India has blamed speculators for the rise in crude prices that have touched an all time high of $142.99 a barrel, but Western oil firms pinned it on demand-supply mismatch. &quot;I don't think you can blame the speculators for the high oil price,&quot; Jeroen Van der Veer, chief executive officer of Europe's biggest oil producer Royal Dutch Shell Plc, said at the 19th WPC. While maintaining that there was more than enough oil to meet global demand, Khelil said the pressure on Iran, the second-largest producer in the cartel, as well as a falling dollar may drive prices to $170 a barrel. &quot;Maybe the price may go up to $150 (a barrel), maybe to $170 (per barrel) as summer driving demand rises. But end of this year, we expect prices to come down,&quot; the OPEC chief said. BP Plc CEO Tony Hayward said, &quot;Speculators believe in the fundamentals.&quot; He said the era of cheap oil was over as expanding economies like China and India boost demand. Qatari Oil Minister Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah said there was no panic anywhere because of shortage of supply. &quot;Its just about the high price...We see in the market there are lots of cargoes.&quot; &quot;Easy oil is very limited and we know most of the new supplies will be difficult oil,&quot; Shell's Van der Veer said. &quot;There is expected tension between supply and demand in the future, which you get in the psychology of the price today.&quot; The financial markets make this trend &quot;more feasible.&quot; &quot;They are not independent of it, but to blame them (speculators) for being the primary movers of the price is hard to prove,&quot; he said. Rejecting suggestions that rising demand was leading to a spurt in crude prices, Chidambaram had said in Jeddah, &quot;The causes for the current pandemonium in oil prices lie elsewhere: in unregulated over the counter markets and future trading in oil&quot; and asked oil producing and consuming nations to wrest control over oil trading from the hands of speculators. The surge in global oil prices had prompted India to increase fuel prices early this month that has caused inflation to surge to a 13 year high of 11.42 per cent. Khelil said on Monday that &quot;there is more than enough oil in the market to meet the international demand,&quot; and that stocks of 53 days are good enough. &quot;There is no lack of supply.&quot; (PTI)