SINGAPORE  - Global commodity traders Gunvor and Trafigura anticipate oil prices may range between $60 and $70 per barrel due to sluggish demand from China and persistent global oversupply, executives told a conference on Monday.

Oil prices have been under pressure due to concerns about waning demand in key economies China and the U.S. - despite earlier expectations of summer demand being supportive - dipping after touching over $90 a barrel earlier this year.

Market relief came after the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies, the group known as OPEC+, agreed last week to delay a planned oil output increase for October and November. However, commodity traders warn this relief may be short-lived.

"The market got a little bit of sugar candy for two months, but really very little," Ben Luckock, global head of oil at Trafigura, told the Asia Pacific Petroleum Conference (APPEC), adding that oil prices may fall 'into the $60s sometime relatively soon.'

"The market wants to know ... that OPEC is not going to bring those barrels back or at best is going to bring it back much slower and on a deferred basis."

Oil's fair value is $70 per barrel as there is more oil currently produced globally than consumed and the balance is set only to worsen over the next few years, said Torbjorn Tornqvist, co-founder and chairman of energy trader Gunvor.

"The problem is not in OPEC, because they've done a great job to manage this," Tornqvist said. "But the problem is that they don't control where the growth is right now outside OPEC, and that's substantial."

Oil futures jumped by a dollar in early Monday trade as a potential hurricane system approached the U.S. Gulf Coast. Later, however, they handed back their gains.

OVERSUPPLY, SOFT CHINA DEMAND

The International Energy Agency (IEA) expects oil supply growth this year to reach 770,000 barrels per day (bpd), boosting total supply to a record 103 million bpd.

That growth is set to more than double next year to reach 1.8 million bpd, with the United States, Canada, Guyana and Brazil leading gains.

"Growth is slowing in the U.S. but not coming to a halt and still significant, which presents another challenge for OPEC+ decision-making," Jim Burkhard, vice president of research at S&P Global Commodity Insights, told the conference.

Burkhard sees OPEC+ increasing oil supply next year for the first time since 2022 and even if the group decides not to do so, spare oil production capacity globally, including over 5 million bpd in the Middle East, is set to pressure prices.

"The cycle of oil supply surplus continues. It will come to an end, but that will be in 2026 or beyond," he said.

Soft demand in China, the world's second-biggest economy, is also worrying markets, Trafigura's Luckock said, adding that some market players believe Beijing may have more economic stimulus in reserve depending on the outcome of the U.S. presidential elections in November.

"There are plenty of examples of what the Chinese central government is doing to help the economy at the moment, but none of it is this big bang headline that sometimes the market wants," Luckock said.

RECORD SHORTS

However, oil is vulnerable to price spikes from geopolitical events or supply disruption due to a record number of short positions in the market, Luckock and Jeff Currie, chief strategy officer of energy pathways at U.S. investment giant Carlyle Group, warned.

"The market has become incredibly relaxed about disruption, because it'll argue that there's millions of barrels of spare capacity. But it can change," Luckock told Reuters.

Currie told Reuters he saw an upside to prices as once the U.S. Federal Reserve starts cutting interest rates, that will reduce some of the pressure on capital-intensive sectors like commodities.

"The upside is generated more from positioning than it is from fundamentals with that record short in oil and gas, there’s a non-trivial possibility that it tries to exit," he said.

"And if it exits, and it's disorderly, then it could create a lot of upside."

(Reporting by Florence Tan, Aizhu Chen, Gabrielle Ng, Jeslyn Lerh, Trixie Yap and Haridas in Singapore; Additional reporting by Nidhi Verma in New Delhi; Writing by Katya Golubkova; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman, Jacqueline Wong and Mark Potter)