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By Bloomberg

Oil traded near the lowest price in a week as negotiators gave differing views about the progress of talks for a nuclear deal with Iran that may allow the OPEC producer to increase crude exports.

Futures were little changed in New York after falling 2.2 percent on Tuesday to cap a third quarterly drop. The foreign ministers of Russia and Iran said consensus on major points of an accord were reached and a statement may be drafted Wednesday. While U.S. and European ministers didn’t brief reporters after talks adjourned, one official said the two sides still had issues to resolve.

Oil is holding losses after the longest run of quarterly declines since 2003 amid speculation Iranian supplies will add to a global glut that cut prices by almost half last year. Diplomats are seeking to reach a pact that would curb the Persian Gulf nation’s nuclear program in exchange for lifting sanctions. Iran tied Kuwait as OPEC’s third-largest producer in March, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

“Iran has a huge capacity to produce and people are worried about that,” Jonathan Barratt, the chief investment officer at Ayers Alliance Securities in Sydney, said by phone. “Especially when you’re adding that into an already oversupplied market.”

West Texas Intermediate for May delivery was at $47.40 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange, down 20 cents, at 1:37 p.m. Singapore time. The contract decreased $1.08 to $47.60 on Tuesday, the lowest close since March 24. Total volume was about 41 percent below the 100- day average.

Nuclear Deal

Brent for May settlement was 16 cents lower at $54.95 a barrel on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange. It slid $1.18 to $55.11 on Tuesday. The European benchmark crude traded at a premium of $7.62 to WTI.

The talks to end a 12-year standoff between Iran and global powers were adjourned at about 1:30 a.m. in Lausanne, Switzerland, a day after they were scheduled to have ended with an outline agreement.

Iran can boost shipments by 1 million barrels a day if sanctions were lifted, Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said March 16. It may be hoarding 7 million to as much as 35 million barrels, shipbrokers and government officials estimated, which Barclays Plc and Societe Generale SA predict would be sold abroad first should a nuclear pact be reached.

U.S. Inventories

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, the 12- member group that supplies about 40 percent of the world’s oil, produced 31 million barrels a day in March, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s the most since August 2013. Iran pumped 2.85 million a day, the fastest pace in a year.

Crude stockpiles in the U.S., the world’s biggest oil consumer, probably rose by 4.2 million barrels in the week ended March 27, expanding from a record, according to the median forecast in the Bloomberg survey of eight analysts before a report from the Energy Information Administration on Wednesday.

Supplies climbed the prior 11 weeks through March 20 to 466.7 million barrels, the highest level in weekly records from the Energy Department’s statistical arm dating back to August 1982. Output accelerated to 9.42 million a day, the most since at least January 1983.

Inventories gained by 5.2 million barrels last week, data from the industry-funded American Petroleum Institute showed Tuesday, according to reports on Twitter.

In China, a factory gauge rebounded in March, indicating that stimulus efforts have began bolstering the economy in the world’s second-largest oil consumer. The government’s manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index was 50.1 last month, up from 49.9 in February, according to the statistics bureau and the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing in Beijing. Readings above 50 signal expansion.