IEA says trade tensions weigh on oil demand, warns of supply surplus
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. The International Energy Agency said the macroeconomic conditions underpinning its oil-demand projections have worsened over the past month due to global trade tensions, and that it sees a bigger-than-anticipated supply surplus if OPEC+ raises output beyond April. “New U.S.
tariffs will clearly act as barriers to global trade and economic growth," the Paris-based agency said. “The lack of clarity due to their on-again off-again nature, combined with the potential for retaliation and escalation, has caused uncertainty to soar." While it is too early to assess their impact on the real economy, the IEA said a tariff-induced “stagflationary" scenario–typically a combination of poor growth and rising prices that befuddle policymakers’ attempts to intervene–is set to weigh on overall oil-demand growth. The agency lowered its demand-growth estimates for the fourth quarter of last year and first quarter of this year to around 1.2 million barrels a day.
It now estimates global demand to grow by 1.03 million barrels a day from 1.1 million barrels a day previously, reaching 103.9 million barrels a day on average. Global growth this year is projected to be higher than last year’s, led by China’s petrochemical sector. But the agency’s projections remain substantially lower than OPEC’s, as the cartel currently expects demand to grow by 1.45 million barrels a day.
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