Members of the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) will meet in Vienna this week to decide on whether to end its production freeze, a market expert has revealed.

The group may be considering lifting the cap altogether, said David Madden market analyst at CMC Markets UK.

“The US asked Saudi Arabia to raise its output to offset the situation in Iran, and there is talk that Saudi Arabia and Russia are keen to ease up on the production freeze agreement.”

On Saturday, Russia’s energy minister Alexander Novak said Russia and Saudi Arabia will ask Opec to hike production by 1.5 million barrels a day in the third quarter of 2018, a report in The Sun Daily said.

"We are only proposing this for the third quarter. In September we will review the situation in the market and decide the future course," the report cited Novak as saying.