Crude oil futures were lower during mid-afternoon trade in Asia Thursday on indications of an uptick in production in Saudi Arabia and the UAE ahead of the OPEC meeting later in the day. At 2:29 pm Singapore time (0629 GMT), ICE February Brent crude futures were down 43 cents/b (0.70%) from Wednesday’s settle at $61.13/b, while the NYMEX January light sweet crude contract was 54 cents/b (1.02%) lower at $52.35/b. The OPEC producer group pumped 40,000 b/d more crude in November than the month before at 33.08 million b/d, the highest monthly total since July 2017, a survey by S&P Global Platts showed. OPEC’s largest producer Saudi Arabia was largely responsible for the increase, pumping 11.02 million b/d in November, up 350,000 b/d from October and setting a record monthly high for the second consecutive […]