Oil market likely to be well balanced in 2019, Saudi energy adviser says

PARIS, April 19 (Reuters) - Ibrahim al-Muhanna, an adviser to the Saudi energy minister, said on Friday he expected the oil market to be "well balanced" this year. "This year, we have seen the implementation of the OPEC Plus decision. It is possible to extend the cut until the end of the year depending on market conditions," al-Muhanna told an oil summit in Paris. The OPEC+ group agreed last year to cut production, partly in response to increased US shale output. Opec+ refers to the alliance of crude producers, who have been undertaking corrections in supply in the oil markets since 2017. Currently, there are 21 sovereign producing nations complying with the alliance's decisions, with Saudi Arabia leading the 11 Opec members party to the deal and 10 non-Opec members led by Russia. The Opec and non-Opec producers first formed the alliance at a historic meeting in Algiers in 2016 with the expressed aim to undertake production restrictions to help resuscitate a flailing market. Saudi, the world’s top oil exporter shipped 6.977 million barrels per day (bpd) in February, compared to 7.254 million bpd in January, according to data from the Joint Organizations Data Initiative (JODI) published on Thursday. It pumped 10.136 million bpd in February, versus 10.243 million bpd in January. Monthly export figures are provided by Riyadh and other members of OPEC to JODI, which publishes them on its website.