The United States is moving closer to Saudi Arabia to become the world's largest exporter, according to IEA

The International Energy Agency (IEA) expects the United States to question Saudi Arabia's position as the world's largest oil exporter after briefly passing the OPEC pillar to grab the top spot earlier this year.

"The booming shale production has allowed the United States to move closer to and briefly supplant Saudi Arabia as the world's largest oil exporter," said IEA in its monthly report closely. monitored on Thursday.

"The installation of necessary pipelines and terminals continues at a steady pace, which will help maintain the trend."

The United States momentarily overtook Saudi Arabia as the largest oil exporter in June, after crude oil exports surpassed 3 million barrels a day (b / d), announced Thursday. ;OUCH. This brought total exports of crude and products to nearly 9 million b / d.

At the same time, Saudi Arabia has reduced its exports of raw and refined products.

The oil-rich kingdom resumed its position in July and August, as the United States was hit by hurricanes. The ongoing trade dispute has also made it difficult for American shale shipments to find markets in recent months, said the IEA.

The Paris-based energy agency's monthly report comes at a time when the United States is actively trying to "dominate energy," regardless of oil price developments.

Speaking to CNBC in Abu Dhabi earlier this week, the US Secretary of State for Energy said that President Donald Trump "often talks about energy dominance".

"The world often asks: what does it mean? It simply means that we will produce as much energy as possible, in the cleanest and most affordable way possible."

"And regardless of the world price of oil, regardless of the world price, electricity, it does not matter, so be it," said Dan Brouillette.

Over the last decade, US oil production has more than doubled to 12.3 million barrels per day, making it the world's largest oil producer.

It now seems ready to flood the oil market with even more crude oil, which will put downward pressure on prices while the market is already struggling to cope with too much supply.

The Brent, an international benchmark, traded at $ 61.05 a barrel on Thursday morning, up about 0.4%, while the US WTI (West Texas Intermediate) was trading at $ 61.05 a barrel on Thursday morning. is $ 56.04, up more than 0.5%.

Brent futures dropped more than 18% from April's high, while WTI lost 15% over the same period.

The IEA said that in the last three months of the year, the United States "should see the development of new export infrastructure that should allow up to 4 million b / d of crude exports. ".

"As production is booming, the question is whether US export price sellers are attractive enough to capture international markets?" the energy agency added.

The IEA left its unchanged oil demand growth forecast at 1.1 million b / d for 2019 and 1.3 million b / d in 2020.

He based his projections on the assumption that there should no longer be a deterioration in the economic climate and trade disputes.

Growth in oil demand will be "significantly stronger", thanks to a relatively weak base in the second half of 2018, lower oil prices compared to a year ago, and an increase in oil capacity. petrochemical, said the IEA.

On Wednesday, OPEC lowered its oil demand growth forecast for the second month in a row.

The group, which includes some of the world's most powerful oil-producing nations, has reduced its global oil demand growth forecast to 1.02 million barrels a day for the rest of the year. It was down 80,000 b / d from its August estimate.

By 2020, OPEC said the world's demand for oil would increase by 1.08 million barrels a day. This represents a downward adjustment of 60,000 b / d from the previous month's valuation.

OPEC attributed this deterioration to weaker than expected economic data in the first half and a deterioration in growth forecasts for the remainder of 2019.