PARIS (AFP) — The International Energy Agency (IEA) believes that the oil market is based on stronger fundamentals this year thanks to vaccines, but on Tuesday revised downwards its forecast of a rebound in demand.

In its monthly oil report, the IEA says that after the unprecedented collapse of 2020, the global roll-out of the vaccine is putting the fundamentals on a more solid trajectory for the year, with both supply and demand returning to growth.

However, the agency has revised its demand forecast slightly downwards, by 0.6 mln barrels per day (Mb/d) for the first quarter and by around 0.3 Mb/d for the full 12 months of 2021. Indeed, it expects that it will take longer for oil demand to fully recover as the new confinements in a number of countries are weighing on fuel sales.

World demand is now expected to rebound by 5.5 Mb/d in 2021 to 96.6 Mb/d following a fall of 8.8 Mb/d last year.