Oil gained almost a dollar on Thursday after a delegate said OPEC had agreed to cut output by 500,000 barrels per day from February, Reuters reports.
The delegate said OPEC had agreed to the cut despite warnings from the International Energy Agency that a previous cut agreed in October was already leaving the market tight. Qatari Oil Minister Abdullah al-Attiyah confirmed the deal.
Front month January contracts for U.S. light crude had risen 98 cents to $62.35 a barrel by 1223 GMT, on top of a 35-cent gain on Wednesday.
London Brent crude for January rose $1.07 cents to $62.40, ahead of its expiry on Thursday, despite analyst doubts about the meaning of the step, which appeared to be a compromise between hawks and doves.
OPEC wants to signal a cut but many members don't want to reduce output. It's a fudge which gets round the market and reconciles the two different views on what the group should do," Geoff Pyne, an independent oil analyst, said.
"If more cuts are needed then surely that proves that half the group didn't comply with the cuts last time. So why should those that did cut do so again?"
The oil producers' club previously appeared to be backtracking on previous suggestions that it would cut output, leaving crude little changed over the day. But crude spiked higher after delegates confirmed they had agreed to cut.
By postponing a further reduction until peak demand has passed, OPEC is responding to importer nations' concern that a cut now will drive prices higher and hurt their economies.
"February 1 cuts make sense as they will impact March deliveries. OPEC generally points to weaker product demand in the second quarter as the driving factor for a cut," Harry Tchilinguirian, analyst at BNP Paribas, said.
But the cut may still disappoint industrialized nations who had asked OPEC not to cut output further below its previous output target of 26.3 million barrels per day.