27-11-07 "The price [of oil] is set by the market.... There is no relationship between the fundamentals and the price of oil; there is a mismatch. Anybody that tells you otherwise is wrong," said Saudi Arabian oil minister Ali Naimi at the Middle East and Asia Energy Summit in Singapore.
When repeatedly asked about the current high oil prices, he said: "How many times do I have to say it. We have absolutely no control over price. The price is determined by a market, which we don't have control over."

And when asked if the market needs more oil, he sidestepped the question. However, he said: "We are producing 9 mm [bpd] today. We have 11.3 [mm bpd capacity], so our spare capacity is 2.3 mm bpd. And in December we are going to add another 500,000 bpd."
OPEC agreed in Vienna on September 11 to raise supply by 500,000 bpd from November 1, partly as a gesture to an oil market that was already trading at record levels that have been successively topped.

In response to current talk about oil being priced in a currency other than the dollar, Naimi said: "To my knowledge, oil has never been priced, since its inception, in another currency.”
When asked if it should be priced in another currency, he replied: "That is debatable.”