Saudi Arabia keeps crude supply to Asia steady

TOKYO (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia, the world's top crude exporter, will supply full contracted volumes of crude oil in April to Asia as it did in March, lifters said on Monday.

Saudi Arabia will supply full-term volumes to two Japanese lifters in April, industry sources said.

"We got the contracted volumes," a trader at a lifter said, adding that the lifter did not ask for additional volumes.

Lifters around the region had expected Saudi allocations to remain steady following a March 5 agreement by Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries to keep output unchanged.

OPEC's next meeting will be on September 9, but it may use producer-consumer talks next month in Rome to review the situation.

The 13-member group, which pumps more than a third of the world's oil, has said it would monitor closely the supply-demand balance.

Saudi Arabia has kept crude supplies to Asian lifters at full contracted volumes since November.

The kingdom raised term exports to Asia by a tenth for November to full contracted volumes after it convinced fellow OPEC members to boost output in response to prices topping $80 a barrel for the first time in September.

(Reporting by James Topham)