Brent rose by almost 2.6%, or 87 cents, to $33.71 a barrel, WTI were up 5%, or $1.27 cents, at $26.36 a barrel

The United States has become the world’s largest producer but Trump’s administration has shown no appetite to mandate cuts.

Saudi Arabia and Russia, the two OPEC+ leaders, have insisted that they will only participate if the US also agrees to production cuts.

The oil market has collapsed due to the coronavirus pandemic, as well as the inability of the OPEC+ alliance to agree on a production cut strategy at its last meeting March 5-6, when Russia rejected a Saudi-led proposal for deeper cuts.

Brent was up by 21 cents, or 0.8%, at $32.08 per barrel, WTI rose 82 cents, or 3.8%, to $24.45 a barrel

"We are encouraged by the President’s strong diplomacy with Saudi Arabia and Russia, and we are optimistic further progress will be made in the days ahead. No one wins in a price war, and the Saudis and the Russians aren’t benefiting from their decisions. We also urged the administration to avoid U.S. policies that could do more harm than good for American producers.

OPEC has been open to counting natural production declines in its output cut agreements, but there is no indication the US would be willing to sign up to that, and some delegates say Russia might not agree such a dressed-up US cut anyway.

Brent crude oil prices averaged $32/barrel (b) in March, a decrease of $24/b from the average in February and the lowest monthly average since January 2016.

The government of Kuwait plans to increase its oil production in April 2020, with an objective of 3.15 mb/d, up from an average production 2.69 mb/d in 2019 (2.74 mb/d in 2018).

Brent was up by 80 cents, or 2.4%, at $33.85 a barrel, WTI was up by 83 cents, or 3.2%, at $26.91 a barrel