What a UAE exit from OPEC means and why it matters

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) announced Tuesday it would quit membership in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and OPEC+. It comes after 59 years at the club. But it could be good news for the world in the long run, experts say.

To understand what happened, it’s important to know that OPEC, which is dominated by Saudi Arabia, is all about restricting crude oil output via quotas to raise energy prices, Marc Chandler, chief market strategist at Bannockburn Capital Markets and an expert on geopolitics, told FOX Business, "The cartel producers discipline the member countries to produce only what the quotas allow and try to get a higher oil price for all."

Soon after the news from the UAE, some media outlets were calling the change a win for President Donald Trump, who has long opposed OPEC’s efforts to keep energy prices high. Quitting OPEC could also be beneficial for the UAE, also known as the Emirates. 

UAE EXITS OPEC AND OPEC+, SEEKING OUTPUT FLEXIBILITY AS GLOBAL ENERGY MARKETS TIGHTEN

"Outside of the cartel, the Emirates will be able to produce more oil," Max Pyziur, research director at Energy Policy Research Foundation, told FOX Business. "It makes sense that they would want to break away."

Specifically, the UAE can now increase its daily oil output. Before the war between the U.S. and Israel against Iran, the Emirates produced 3.6 million barrels of oil a day, according to recent data from the International Energy Agency. But it now plans to increase output to as much as 5 million barrels a day in 2027.

Another part of the UAE leaving the cartel is that the country has been using its own 249-mile-long pipeline to bypass the Strait of Hormuz, which has been difficult to pass since the war began. The pipeline gets the oil to the Gulf of Oman, Chandler says. "If the strait is reopened and the UAE has a lot to rebuild, it will sell more oil and not linger under the thumb of OPEC."

Another reason for the Emirates leaving OPEC is the tension between Saudi Arabia, which dominates the oil quota system, and the UAE. "The two have been at loggerheads for a while," Chandler says. Notably, the two countries have widely differing views about Yemen. On the Saudi view, Yemen is a possible threat as well as a potential buffer, while the UAE seeks to influence Yemen using proxies.

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On Tuesday, Brent Crude Oil was trading at $111 per barrel. That means the extra 1.4 million barrels the UAE is planning could provide much-needed cash to help repair the damage from the recent Iranian attacks. "The repair bill could be large for the UAE," Clayton Seigle, senior fellow in the CSIS Energy Security and Climate Change Program, told FOX Business.

Iran has had a big impact on the oil-rich countries in the Middle East. "We can assume that until the war began in late February, many countries thought that the U.S. bases were protective, as you had a U.S. presence," Chandler says. The evidence is that while Iran did bomb countries such as the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait and Oman, it also hit U.S. bases across the region. "Now Iran has shown the U.S. bases are a sign of vulnerability," he said.

The UAE wasn’t the first to quit OPEC. Qatar did the same in 2019. But this change could lead more oil-rich OPEC members to leave the organization. So, who’s next?

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"Iraq will probably be thinking that if rich UAE is quitting, then why should we be left holding the bag," Seigle says. "The big risk is the domino effect with more countries following the UAE out the door, and that would weigh on medium-term oil prices.

Ultimately, analysts say a collapse of OPEC could lead to far lower oil prices worldwide.