Goldman Sachs expects Brent to decline to low $50s by late 2026

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(Reuters) -Goldman Sachs expects the price of Brent crude futures contracts to decline to the low $50s a barrel by late 2026 due to an increase in the surplus of oil next year.

“We expect the oil surplus to widen and average 1.8 million barrels per day in 2025 Q4 (through) 2026 Q4, resulting in a nearly 800 million barrel rise in global stocks by end 2026,” the U.S. investment bank said in a client note on Tuesday.

It estimated that stored oil in member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development will account for a third of total global stock or 270 million barrels in 2026. Coupled with reduced demand in OECD countries, it said this will lower Brent’s fair value from the current mid-$70s.

Goldman said Brent prices are likely to remain near those of forward contracts during the rest of 2025 but fall below those contracts next year as the increase in OECD stock accelerates.

However, it said potential acceleration in the growth of Chinese stock to 0.8 million barrels a day from 0.4 million barrels a day in the year to date would raise the 2026 Brent average by $6 a barrel versus the bank’s baseline to $62.

Brent crude futures contracts were trading around $67 a barrel in early Asian trade on Wednesday. West Texas Intermediate crude futures contracts were trading at $63.

(Reporting by Brijesh Patel and Ishaan Arora in Bengaluru; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman; Editing by Christopher Cushing)