The Year in Preview

Oil and gasoline prices should decline and petroleum supplies grow as the Asian economic slowdown softens global demand for crude. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, which supplies, on average, 25 million of the 75 million barrels of oil consumed daily worldwide, will increase its quota 10% on Jan. 1. Also boosting oil supplies are new or expanded non-OPEC sources, notably in the North Sea, Colombia and the Gulf of Mexico. Also in ‘98, Iraq is expected to increase its production under United Nations sanctions. So crude prices, which have already declined $5 a barrel over the last year to about $18.50, could drop another $1 to $2 in 1998, and gasoline prices, which are also declining, should drop 4 or 5 cents a gallon as a result.