The latest OPEC meeting in Vienna reached an uneventful conclusion on Thursday. Compared with the December 2015 meeting, which ran well overtime, and an unproductive April meeting, Thursday's event was different — not in result (OPEC producers reached no consensus on a policy change) but in tone. By all accounts, the discussion was positive, and the group agreed that the oil market was recovering. And it is, albeit slowly. The U.S. Energy Information Administration released data on Wednesday showing that U.S. production had fallen to an estimated 8,735,000 barrels per day, down 200,000 bpd since April's meeting and 430,000 bpd since December's. Meanwhile, the price of Brent crude oil closed above $50 on Thursday for the first time since November. Despite the meeting's cordial atmosphere, most OPEC producers — beyond the power players in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) — remain in dire political, economic and financial straits.