On the sidelines of Atlantic Council's Global Energy Forum in Abu Dhabi over the weekend, UAE Energy Minister Suhail al-Mazrouei said that the oil market is ‘stable’ at the moment, unperturbed by the price caps on Russian crude oil.

Key quotes

"The market is a bit stable, and we think the decisions we took have been a good decision and an indication of the stabilization that we are seeing.”

"Now with China opening, hopefully we will see a pickup in demand and when we meet, we will analyze that as usual. We always take the decision that serves the balancing of the market."

“No comments on how Russian oil volumes going forward would be affected by the price cap and sanctions.”

These factors are external and "outside our control."

Market reaction

WTI is unable to take advantage of the encouraging comments, trading 0.45% lower at around $79.80. The US oil hit an intraday high of $80.43, earlier on.