With the U.S. Energy Information Administration reporting a weekly increase in crude oil inventories of 1.1 million barrels, oil prices rose today.
The prior week’s increase was 1.6 million barrels.
Both gasoline and distillate fuel supplies were reported to be down by the authority for the week ending March 17th.
At the conclusion of last week, crude oil stocks in the United States reached 481.2 million barrels, which is about eight percent above the five-year average for this time of year.
Crude oil stocks were thought to have grown by about 3.3 million gallons in the week ending March 17, according to the American Petroleum Institute, which put further downward pressure on prices the previous day.
For the week ending March 17th, EIA data showed a decrease in gasoline inventories of 6.4 million barrels, compared to a depletion of 2.1 million barrels the previous week.
During the time under review, an average of 9.5 million barrels per day of gasoline was produced, up from an earlier week’s average of 9.1 million bpd.
The EIA predicted a 3.3-million-barrel draw in middle distillates during the week ending March 17, up from the 2.5 million barrel draw the prior week.
In comparison to the prior week’s average of 4.4 million bpd, production of middle distillate rose to 4.5 million bpd last week.
The release of the API inventory report on Tuesday sent oil prices tumbling, and the market’s anticipation of the Federal Reserve’s statement on interest rates and other monetary policy after its routinely scheduled two-day meeting continued into Wednesday.
The drop came after oil’s fortunes had turned around, and after modest gains for benchmarks had followed easing fears about the global banking system in the wake of two US bank collapses and Credit Suisse’s narrow escape, from which it had emerged only because peer UBS agreed to take it over with the financial support of the Swiss government.
Heating Oil News.
