The American Petroleum Institute (API) reported a huge build of 5.661 million barrels of United States crude oil inventories for the week ending March 2, according to the API data. Analysts had expected a build of 2.723 million barrels in crude oil inventories.
Last week, the American Petroleum Institute (API) reported a build of 933,000 barrels of crude oil. Last week's API report showed a build in gasoline inventories of 1.914 million barrels.
This week, the API reporting a build for crude oil, but a draw for gasoline, possibly dampening the affects that such a large crude oil build could have. The API reported a draw of 4.536 million in gasoline stockpiles, compared to a 1.201-million-barrel draw that analysts had expected.
The WTI benchmark was down on Tuesday, trading mostly down by $.05 (-0.08%) at $62.52, while Brent trading up $0.18 (+0.27%) at $65.72 at 3:32pm EST. Both benchmarks were trading down from last Tuesday afternoon.
As crude oil inventories built for the week, US crude oil production for week ending February 23 also increased, coming in at 10.283 million bpd, well on its way toward the 10.7 million bpd that the EIA suspects will be seen in 2018. If met, this would be the "highest annual average U.S. crude oil production level, surpassing the previous record of 9.6 million bpd set in 1970," the EIA said in its latest Short Term Energy Outlook issued today. The EIA expects next year's US production to average 11.3 million bpd, the report said.
Related: Nigeria Can Produce Oil At $20 A Barrel
Distillate inventories saw a build this week of 1.487 million barrels. Analysts had forecast a decline of 1.20 million barrels.
Inventories at the Cushing, Oklahoma, site decreased by 790,000 barrels this week.
The U.S. Energy Information Administration report on oil inventories is due to be released on Wednesday at 10:30a.m. EST.
By 4:35pm EST, the WTI benchmark was trading down even more at .019% on the day to $62.45 while Brent was trading up 0.18% on the day at $65.66.
By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com
More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
Julianne Geiger is a veteran editor, writer and researcher for Oilprice.com, and a member of the Creative Professionals Networking Group. More
Comments