OPEC+ maintains modest monthly increases in oil output

OPEC and allied oil-producing countries have decided to maintain the amount of oil they pump to the world even as the new omicron variant casts a spikey shadow of uncertainty over the global economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic

WASHINGTON -- OPEC and allied oil-producing countries have decided to maintain the amount of oil they pump to the world even as the new omicron variant casts a spikey shadow of uncertainty over the global economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.

Officials from OPEC countries, led by Saudi Arabia, and their allies, led by Russia, voted Thursday to stick with a pre-omicron pattern of steady, modest monthly increases in oil releases — a pace that has frustrated the United States and other oil-consuming nations as gasoline prices rise.

Before omicron’s appearance, the meeting had been shaping up as a potentially fraught moment in a growing dispute between oil-supplying nations and oil-consuming ones, as the economy rebounds from the worst of the pandemic and demand for oil surged.

With rising gas prices putting him under political pressure, President Joe Biden last week responded to OPEC’s refusal to increase supplies more quickly by announcing the U.S. and other nations would release tens of millions of barrels of oil from their strategic reserves, boosting supplies and lowering prices.