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Informist, Thursday, Feb. 12, 2026

 

MUMBAI – The International Energy Agency has lowered its forecast for growth in global oil demand this year mainly because of global economic uncertainties and higher oil prices weighing on consumption. At the same time, it expects global oil supply to rebound in the coming months as production recovers after the exceptional plunge last month.

 

The Paris-based intergovernmental organisation expects global oil demand to rise by 850,000 barrels per day in 2026, lower than its previous projection of growth of 930,000 barrels per day, the agency said in its oil market report for February. The entire increase in demand will be led by non-OECD economies, with China taking the lead on a country level. "Petrochemical feedstock products will represent more than half of this year's gains, compared with only a third in 2025 when transport fuels dominated growth," it said.

 

Global oil output is now forecast to rise by 2.4 million barrels per day to 108.6 million barrels per day in 2026, with growth almost evenly split between non-OPEC+ and OPEC+ producers. This is, however, lower than the 2.5 million barrels per day growth the agency expected last month. Global oil supply plunged by 1.2 million barrels per day in January as severe winter in the West disrupted North American operations and outages and export constraints curtailed Kazakh, Russian, and Venezuelan flows, the agency said.

 

Meanwhile, OPEC+ producers reconfirmed their plan to maintain current production quotas through March. "In this context, global oil supply is expected to rebound in the coming months as output recovers from the exceptional plunge in January, when extreme winter weather forced the shut-in of over 1 mb/d (million barrels per day) of output in North America," it said.

 

Russian oil supply also declined in January, by a sizeable 350,000 barrels per day, as its key customers came under increased pressure from Washington and broader EU sanctions. "Shipments to India have been hit particularly hard as fresh EU restrictions on imports of petroleum products derived from Russian crude prompted key export refineries to look for alternative supplies," it said. Indian imports of Russian crude fell to 1.1 million barrels per day last month, the lowest level since November 2022, and down from 1.7 million barrels per day on average in 2025.

 

Benchmark crude oil prices surged by $10 per barrel over January as a number of supply outages tightened physical crude markets and geopolitical tensions rose between Iran and the US. While prices fell a few dollars at the start of February on reports of progress in ongoing negotiations to de-escalate the tensions, they quickly reversed course after the US advised ships to steer clear of Iranian waters when navigating the Strait of Hormuz. At 1505 IST, the price of Brent crude on the Intercontinental Exchange was 0.4% lower at $69.12 per barrel and that of WTI crude on NYMEX was at $64.42 per barrel, down 0.3%.

 

Global observed oil inventories rose by 37 million barrels in December, taking total stock builds in 2025 to 477 million barrels. Chinese crude oil stocks rose by 111 million barrels last year, while oil on water swelled by 248 million barrels, of which sanctioned oil accounted for 72%. Global stocks surged by a further 49 million barrels in January, the agency said, citing preliminary data.  End

 

US$1 = INR 90.59

IST, or Indian Standard Time, is five-and-a-half hours ahead of GMT

 

Reported by Ashutosh Pati

Edited by Avishek Dutta

 

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