U.S. Crude Oil and Product Inventories Show Widespread Declines

Crude oil inventories in the United States dropped by 3.4 million barrels for the week ending August 23, as reported by the American Petroleum Institute (API), surpassing analysts’ expectations of a 3 million barrel decline. This follows a 347,000-barrel increase in crude inventories reported by the API the previous week.

Year-to-date, U.S. crude oil inventories have decreased by over 2.6 million barrels, putting them more than 2 million barrels below where they were at the beginning of the year, according to API data.

Meanwhile, the Department of Energy (DoE) reported a 0.7 million barrel rise in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) for the same week, bringing the total to 377.90 million barrels.

On Tuesday, oil prices fell ahead of the API data release. As of 4:24 pm ET, Brent crude was down $1.76 (-2.16%) at $79.67 per barrel, although it was still up about $1.40 from the previous week. The U.S. benchmark, West Texas Intermediate (WTI), also dropped by $1.71 (-2.21%) to $75.71 per barrel, but remained up roughly $0.70 from the previous week.

Gasoline inventories saw a drawdown of 1.86 million barrels this week, following a 1.043-million-barrel decrease the previous week, with analysts having predicted a smaller 1.6-million-barrel draw. As of last week, gasoline inventories were 3% below the five-year average for this time of year, according to the latest data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA).

Distillate inventories also fell by 1.4 million barrels this week, adding to last week’s 2.247-million-barrel decrease. Analysts had expected a 1.1-million-barrel decline. Distillate stocks are now about 10% below the five-year average for the week ending August 16, according to the EIA.

Cushing, Oklahoma—home to a key oil storage hub—also saw a decline, with inventories dropping by 486,000 barrels, following a 648,000-barrel draw the previous week, as per API data.

Source: Oilprice.com