Oil Market Supply and Demand Outlook
1. International Energy Agency (IEA): Projects a supply surplus of over 4 million barrels per day (bpd) in the first half of 2026, with an average surplus of over 3.7 million bpd for the whole year.
2. U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA): Projects supply will exceed demand by over 2.8 million bpd this year, with a peak surplus exceeding 3.5 million bpd this quarter.
3. OPEC: Projects an average supply surplus of only about 600,000 bpd this year (this forecast considers the market close to equilibrium).
Key Differences
1. Total Demand Gap: The IEA's demand forecast for 2026 is slightly below 105 million bpd, about 1.5 million bpd lower than OPEC's forecast. This gap has narrowed slightly since August last year, with the IEA raising its forecast by 540,000 bpd over the past five months, while OPEC's forecast has remained unchanged.
2. Differences in Demand Growth Rates: The IEA projects oil consumption will increase by 930,000 barrels per day (bpd) in 2026, but this is only about two-thirds of OPEC's forecast. The IEA believes that the average annual growth rate of consumption from 2023 to 2026 will be only 0.9%, far below the historical average. OPEC, on the other hand, believes that oil demand has grown at an average annual rate of 1.3% since 2023. The EIA's outlook falls somewhere in between, estimating an average annual growth rate of about 1.2%.
3. Differences in Historical Assessments: The gap between OPEC and EIA's demand assessments has widened from approximately 1.2 million bpd in 2023 to 1.7 million bpd this year. The divergence between OPEC and the IEA is even more significant; their estimates for demand in 2023 differed by only 200,000 bpd, but the gap in their 2026 forecasts has widened to over 1.5 million bpd.
