ENERGY

OPEC Leaves Production Quotas Unchanged: Believing it has found the key to higher prices, the cartel left untouched its crude production levels for the rest of 1994. In adopting a hands-off policy, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries is gambling that oil prices will continue rallying in the fall and winter, with increased demand for crude in the United States and elsewhere. Oil prices tumbled late last year to their lowest levels in five years. But since the cartel agreed in March to cap its output at 24.5 million barrels a day through the end of the year, the price of the U.S. benchmark grade of oil has gained more than $5 a barrel. Crude oil prices rose sharply Wednesday, reaching their highest level in more than a year and flirting with the $20-a-barrel mark.