International Energy Agency (IEA) states have agreed to release of 60 million barrels of oil from
storage.
The international release comes on top of a 180-million-barrel release announced by the U.S.
last week aimed at lowering gas prices that have been elevated since Russia invaded Ukraine
at the end of February.
The move by the IEA, which represent 31 industrialized countries but not Russia, would be their
second coordinated release in a month and would be the fifth in the agency's history to confront
oil market outages.
Sanctions and buyer aversion have disrupted Russian oil supplies, pushing oil near $140 U.S. a
barrel on March 7 despite the previous IEA releases.
The new release comes as the U.S. and its allies struggle with multi-decade high inflation and
rising energy and gasoline prices. High fuel prices are a vulnerability for Democratic U.S.
President Joe Biden ahead of November 8 congressional elections.
Brent crude oil, the international benchmark, fell 5% to $101.50 U.S. a barrel on news of the IEA
release. The timing of when the additional 60 million barrels from IEA countries would come to
market was not immediately clear.
