London — Opec extended oil production cuts for nine more months after last year’s landmark agreement failed to eliminate the global oversupply or achieve a sustained price recovery. Members meeting in Vienna agreed to prolong their accord through to March 2018, Kuwait’s Oil Minister Issam Almarzooq said. Nigeria and Libya remain exempt from the cuts and Iran, which was allowed to increase output under the original accord, retains the same output target, he said. Six months after forming an unprecedented coalition of 24 nations and delivering output reductions that exceeded expectations, resurgent production from US shale fields has meant oil inventories remain well above target. While supplies are shrinking, ministers acknowledged that the surplus built up during three years of overproduction would not clear until at least the end of 2017. "The market seems to be a bit disappointed as there is no ‘something extra’ the markets waited for," said Jan Edelmann, a commodity analyst at HS...
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