* Oil down more than $2 after no cut from OPEC
* OPEC to discuss 1 to 1.5 mbpd cut later in December
* Saudi Arabia cites $75 a barrel as "fair price"
(Recasts, adds comment, updates prices, previous SINGAPORE)
By Jane Merriman
LONDON, Dec 1 (Reuters) - Oil fell more than $2 to below $52
a barrel on Monday after OPEC decided to wait until mid-December
to make another cut in output to try to defend sagging prices.
U.S. light crude for January delivery <CLc1> was down $2.53
at $51.90 a barrel by 0937 GMT.
Oil had settled at $54.43 on Friday after a shortened
post-Thanksgiving holiday session. On Nov. 21, it touched a
three and half year low of $48.25.
London Brent crude <LCOc1> was $2.62 lower at $50.87 a
barrel.
"The markets are discounting OPEC's decision to stand put by
selling off," said Edward Meir, analyst at broker MF Global.
"When it comes to calibrating supply and demand to fit the
new post-September economic realities, OPEC seems to be in a
state of denial," he said in a research note.
Oil is down by almost two-thirds from a peak of more than
$147 a barrel in July. Prices fell almost 20 percent in November
and 32 percent in October, their biggest monthly fall ever,
despite OPEC's around 2 million barrels per day cutbacks.
"FAIR PRICE"
A global economic slowdown that has tipped a growing number
of countries into recession has caused sharp falls in demand for
oil.
But OPEC's Gulf producers want to see strict compliance with
the producer group's existing output curbs of 2 million barrels
per day (bpd) before agreeing to any more.
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)
meets next in Algeria on Dec. 17. []
Saudi Arabia on Saturday pointed to $75 a barrel as a "fair
price" for oil, the first time in years that the world's biggest
exporter has identified a target for crude prices.[]
Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi in Cairo cited this price as
necessary to keep more expensive new projects at the margins of
world supply on track.
"I believe $75 is the price for the marginal producer," he
told reporters in Cairo.
On Sunday he told the Saudi-owned al-Hayat newspaper the
effect of OPEC's existing cuts was still not clear.[]
In Cairo, OPEC ministers discussed how much more they needed
to cut. Most, including Gulf producers led by Saudi Arabia, saw
the need to trim another 1 to 1.5 million bpd.
OPEC Secretary General al-Badri told reporters in Tehran on
Monday: "It will be a good amount, a good quantity," without
naming a specific figure. []
Analysts said OPEC's delay could prove costly.
"The longer OPEC waits to cut supplies, the higher stocks
rise and the longer we think it'll take for fundamentals to
tighten once the tide does turn," Jan Stuart, an economist with
UBS in New York, said in a weekly U.S. oil data report.
(Additional reporting by Maryelle Demongeot in Singapore and
Osamu Tsukimori on Tokyo; editing by James Jukwey)
