Half-life: the US predicted the inevitable collapse of OPEC
The collapse of the OPEC oil alliance is inevitable after the situation in the Middle East improves, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessant has warned. Trump even declared it an "illegal cartel." Izvestia investigated what the United States did not like about OPEC, how the organization affects the global oil market, and whether there are alternatives to the alliance.
"Disintegration is inevitable"
The imminent collapse of the OPEC oil alliance after the normalization of the situation in the Middle East was warned by US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
"One day <...> the situation in the Middle East will return to normal, and OPEC will collapse," Bessent said during a discussion at the Cox Business School at Southern Methodist University.
OPEC is an international association established in 1960 by the leading oil—producing countries to coordinate production, control export quotas and stabilize world crude oil prices.
The logic of the head of the US Treasury Department is that the end of conflicts will lead to an oversupply of the oil market — the geopolitical premium to the price will disappear and expose a fundamental excess of capacity, explains Konstantin Pozdnyakov, Doctor of Economics, specialist in project management.
We have to adjust
Bessent's position continues the line of US President Donald Trump, who has long criticized OPEC, and in 2020 called it illegal.
"I've been opposed to OPEC all my life, because what is it? This is an illegal structure, you can call it a cartel, you can call it a monopoly," the US president said.
The US dissatisfaction with OPEC's activities is understandable. The main reason is the price of oil. For Washington, a low or moderate price means several advantages at once: cheap fuel on the domestic market, lower inflation, and benefits for American oil companies. And in addition, the decline in oil revenues of Russia, Iran and other major oil-producing countries.
OPEC is closely monitoring the price: if it falls too low, the largest producers reduce production and remove excess barrels from the market.
America, which has grown from the largest importer of oil to one of the largest producers and exporters in 15 years, does not want to depend at all on the decisions of the "heavyweights" of OPEC — Russia and Saudi Arabia.
The economic benefits of the US weakening OPEC are obvious. Among other things, cheap oil strengthens the position of the American shale industry as a balancing producer not bound by cartel quotas, Pozdnyakov explains.
The risks have increased
The risks to the stability of the alliance are indeed accumulating. In May 2026, the United Arab Emirates officially withdrew from OPEC and OPEC+.
There was a conflict of interest: the country had invested a lot of money in increasing oil production and wanted to produce more than its quotas allowed.
As Reuters noted at the time, the UAE planned to increase the quota from about 3.5 million barrels per day in accordance with the updated production capacity.
Analysts also do not rule out that, following the Emirates, the association may leave Kuwait, which has invested tens of billions of dollars in upgrading equipment at fields and processing plants.
These investments need to be discouraged by sales volumes, but OPEC+ often sets quotas below the potential level, and this harms national interests, explains Olga Orlova, head of the Industry department at the Institute of Oil and Gas Technologies.
And at the end of August, there were reports that Venezuela, one of the founding countries of the organization, was also considering withdrawing from it.
According to experts, the withdrawal of even one participant does not immediately destroy the quota mechanism, but creates a precedent and undermines negotiation discipline within the group.
The levers are loosening
In addition, objective factors are putting pressure on the work of OPEC and OPEC+, in particular, an oversupply in the global market.
— Countries outside the cartel are increasing production, regardless of OPEC+ decisions. This dilutes the effectiveness of any cuts. The increase in the production of electric vehicles and renewable energy in the EU and China reduces the growth rate of oil demand," says Sergey Tolkachev, professor at the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation.
In this regard, the levers of physical influence of the association are really weakening: if demand falls, production restrictions often accelerate the fall in prices, since unused volumes of oil simply "freeze" in the ground," the economist explains.
The two pillars
Nevertheless, it is premature to talk about a decrease in the alliance's real "market power."
While the world is still consuming a huge amount of oil. In 2025, global oil demand approached 105 million barrels per day, and in 2026, OPEC expects it to increase by 0.38 million b/d to 105.84 million b/d.
In addition, it is the expanded membership of the association of oil exporters — OPEC+, led by Russia and Saudi Arabia — that is the real mechanism for managing the global oil market. The Group, which controls a significant portion of cheap stocks, retains a huge structural advantage.
The Saudis, with their capacity and ability to play with the volume of barrels, are primarily a regulator. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA) estimate for July 2026, Riyadh's sustainable production capacity was approximately 12.1 million bpd compared to the actual 8.24 million bpd. That is, the theoretical reserve was about 3.9 million bpd.
Russia is a producer and exporter with extensive infrastructure: Western and Eastern Siberia, the Arctic, pipelines, ports. Plus a large-scale processing and export system.
According to the IEA, in July 2026, Russian production was about 8.76 million b/d with an estimated sustainable capacity of 9.4 million b/d.
Thus, the Saudis influence the market as a "stabilizing producer", Russia — through a huge volume of physical supply.
This makes for an extremely powerful combination, given that both countries account for every fifth barrel produced in the world.
There is no alternative
Thus, OPEC+ is an oligopoly of two poles (Saudi Arabia and Russia) that control the market through a "swing": they either increase production to punish competitors, including the US shale producers, or they reduce it to keep prices down.
"Without Russia, OPEC cannot control 40% of global supply — this became obvious in 2020-2021, when Russia withdrew from deals and the market collapsed," points out Sergey Tolkachev.
As Konstantin Pozdnyakov emphasizes, for decades the alliance has assumed the function of a damper during geopolitical shocks and natural disasters. This ability also manifested itself during the pandemic. Neither the U.S. shale industry nor independent producers have such tools.
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