OPEC+ committee expects oil market to return to surplus in 2022

DUBAI/LONDON (Reuters) -The OPEC+ joint technical committee (JTC) expects the oil market to remain in a 0.9 million barrel per day (bpd) deficit this year, but hit a surplus of 2.5 million bpd in 2022 as the group raises production, a presentation seen by Reuters showed.

The JTC, under a base-case scenario, expects global oil demand to grow by 5.95 million bpd this year, in line with its previous forecast, and by 3.28 million bpd next year.

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and allies led by Russia, collectively known as OPEC+, meet on Wednesday at 1500 GMT to set policy.

Sources told Reuters the Wednesday meeting is likely to leave the plan unchanged despite pressure from the United States to pump more oil.

The JTC, which advises the meeting on market fundamentals, expects commercial oil inventories in OECD countries to remain below their 2015-2019 average until January next year but to exceed that average for the rest of 2022, the JTC presentation showed.

The presentation also outlined an alternative scenario, that assumes lower demand growth and non-OPEC supply growth higher than the base case.

Under the alternative scenario, the oil market is expected to have a surplus of 400,000 bpd in 2021 and 4.5 million bpd in 2022.

(Reporting by Rania El Gamal, Alex Lawler and Ahmad GhaddarEditing by David Goodman)