By Karin Strohecker and Peter Dinkloh
VIENNA (Reuters) - Record oil prices will fall back to between $50 and $60 a barrel during the European winter as issues such as worries about a Turkish invasion into Iraq fade, the chief of Austrian oil and gas group OMV said.
A price below $60 a barrel is justified by the economic environment and is a "reasonable assumption," Chief Executive Wolfgang Ruttenstorfer told the Reuters Central European Investment Summit on Wednesday.
The oil price "does not fit," he said. "We don't think this is going to stay for the winter."
An inflow of investor money, tension in northern Iraq over a potential Turkish incursion and tight fuel supplies in the United States have driven oil prices above $88 a barrel CLc1.
When adjusted for inflation that is close to the all-time high reached in 1980.
At OMV, the record prices will boost net income, Ruttenstorfer said, without being more specific and declining to predict OMV's earnings for 2007.
OMV last year increased operating earnings 5 percent to 2.1 billion euros ($2.98 billion), on sales of 19 billion euros.
The firm's shares rose 1.2 percent to 50.00 euros at 1430 GMT, in line with the move in the Austrian blue chip index ATX Continued...
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