Crude oil inventories in the United States decreased by 1 million barrels during the week ending October 17, after gaining 3.5 million barrels in the week prior, according to new data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released on Wednesday. The increase brings commercial stockpiles to 422.8 million barrels according to government data, which is still 4% below the five-year average for this time of year.

The EIA’s data release follows API’s figures that were released a day earlier, which suggested that crude oil inventories saw a surprise decline in inventory of 2.980 million barrels.

Crude prices were trading up on Wednesday morning in the run-up to the EIA data release. At 10:12 a.m. in New York, Brent was trading at $62.74 per barrel—up $1.42 (+2.32%) on the day and a roughly $1.20 per barrel increase over last week’s level. WTI was also trading up, by $1.41 per barrel (+2.46%) in mid-morning trade.

For total motor gasoline, the EIA reported that inventories had contracted by 2.1 million barrels, after the week prior’s 300,000-barrel decrease. The most recent figures showed average daily gasoline production increasing to 9.6 million barrels. For middle distillates, inventories decreased by another 1.5 million barrels, despite production increasing by 40,000 barrels daily to an average of 4.6 million barrels daily. Distillate inventories drew down by 4.5 million barrels in the week prior and are now 7% below the five-year average for this time of year.

Total products supplied over the last four weeks slipped to 20.5 million barrels per day, down 0.1% compared to the same period last year. Gasoline demand averaged 8.6 million barrels per day over the last four weeks, while the distillate four-week average supplied hovered 4.0 million barrels—up 0.2 percent year over year.
By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com

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