LONDON, Feb 11 (Reuters) – Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) could help to calm volatile oil markets if they pumped more crude, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Friday. The UAE and Saudi Arabia are the two oil producers with the most spare production capacity and could help to relieve dwindling global oil inventories that have been among factors pushing prices towards $100 a barrel, deepening inflation worldwide. The IEA said that effective spare capacity could fall to 2.5 million barrels per day (bpd) by the end of the year, held up almost entirely by Saudi Arabia and, to a lesser extent, the UAE. The need to refill depleted oil stocks, which in OECD countries have slumped to seven-year lows, means immediate oversupply is unlikely. “We don’t see it as a huge surplus looming over the market,” she told reporters.
