Brent oil spikes higher after Trump says Russia and Saudi will cut output

Traders in Brent crude oil endured a rollercoaster-like session after the US President said Russia and Saudi had agreed to restrain their combined output, but Russian officials quickly appeared to call that into doubt, at least in part.

In remarks posted to his personal account on Twitter, Donald Trump said: "just spoke to my friend [Mohammad Bin Salman] (Crown Prince) of Saudi Arabia, who spoke with President Putin of Russia, & I expect & hope that they will be cutting back approximately 10 Million Barrels, and maybe substantially more which, if it happens, will be GREAT for the oil & gas industry!"

The US President had already expressed confidence the day before that a deal between those two foreign oil powers was possible, but some market observers expressed skepticism that he would be proved right.

To take note of, Trump also said: "If they are unable to solve it, then I think I know what to do to solve it. We will not mention it now, but it is tough."

And on Thursday, Russian government spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, reportedly said that no understanding had been reached to replace the current OPEC+ format.

According to RIA Novosti, Peskov also denied that Putin and Bin Salman had held talks.

Some analysts also called into question Trump's assertion regarding a 10m barrel cut, explaining that it was "impossible to imagine" such a reduction in daily output was on the table from OPEC+ as it would amount to roughly 30% of the group's combined production.

Earlier the same day, Saudi had called for an emergency OPEC+ meeting and said that a decision to reduce output should include a "group of other countries", in likely reference to Russia but perhaps also to the US.

As of 1651 GMT, front month Brent crude oil futures were running up by 19.4% to $30.67 a barrel on the ICE, having earlier reached an intra-session high of $36.29 a barrel.