Investing.com - Oil prices fell on Wednesday in Asia after Saudi Arabia’s energy minister said the kingdom is recovering faster than expected from an attack on the weekend that knocked out 5% of global oil output.
U.S. Crude Oil WTI Futures were down 0.4% to $58.87 by 12:30 AM ET (04:30 GMT). International Brent Oil Futures fell 0.2% to $64.44.
Saudi Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman said in a press conference overnight that the kingdom will restore lost oil production by the end of September.
Average oil production in September and October would be 9.89 million barrels per day, he said, adding that Saudi would ensure full oil supply commitments to its customers this month.
Meanwhile, State-owned Aramco CEO Amin Nassser said full capacity of 12 million barrels per day would be back at the end of November.
Oil prices were already falling yesterday after a Reuters report cited a Saudi official as predicting the kingdom could fully restore oil output within two to three weeks.
Earlier reports suggested it would take far longer to bring output back to normal after missile attacks over the weekend took an estimated 5.77 million barrels a day of production offline.
On the data front, the American Petroleum Institute said U.S. stockpiles rose by about 600,000 barrels last week. They dropped by 7.2 million barrels the week before.