Oil prices plunged as the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) reported the highest oil output in November since 2009. OPEC released its monthly report on Thursday. OPEC's oil output in November rose by 230,100 barrels per day (bpd) to 31.695 million bpd from October, mainly due to higher oil output from Iraq.

OPEC lowered its 2016 output forecasts for non-OPEC members by 250,000 bpd to average 57.14 million bpd. The downward revision was driven by a drop in U.S. shale-oil production.

Global oil demand growth is expected to be 1.25 million bpd in 2016, unchanged from its previous estimates and down from a 1.53 million bpd rise this year.

Oil prices yesterday rose on the U.S. crude oil inventories data. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released its crude oil inventories data on Wednesday. U.S. crude inventories dropped by 3.57 million barrels to 485.9 million in the week to December 04. It was the first decline since September. Analysts had expected U.S. crude oil inventories to remain unchanged.

WTI crude oil for January delivery slid to $36.52 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Brent crude oil for January dropped to $39.87 a barrel on ICE Futures Europe.