By Dan Molinski
U.S. commercial inventories of crude-oil increased last week as refineries reduced activity and as the government transferred more of the nation's Strategic Petroleum Reserve to the commercial side, according to data released Wednesday by the Energy Information Administration.
Benchmark U.S. oil prices that were higher before the report was released added to those gains afterward. The Nymex front-month crude contract for December delivery was recently up 2.8% at $87.74 a barrel.
Commercial crude-oil stockpiles rose by 2.6 million barrels, to 439.9 million barrels, and are still 2% below the five-year average, the EIA said. Analysts surveyed by The Wall Street Journal had predicted crude stockpiles would rise by just 600,000 barrels from the prior week.
Oil stored at Cushing, Okla., the delivery point for U.S. stocks, increased by 667,000 barrels from the previous week to 26.9 million barrels, the EIA said in its weekly report.
U.S. crude-oil production remained unchanged last week at 12 million barrels a day, according to the EIA.
Gasoline stockpiles fell by 1.5 million barrels to 207.9 million barrels, compared with analysts' expectations for inventories to decrease by 900,000 barrels from the previous week.
Distillate stocks, which include heating oil and diesel fuel, rose by 170,000 barrels to 106.4 million barrels, but are still about 20% below the five-year average, the EIA said. Analysts had forecast distillates inventories would fall by 1.1 million barrels from the previous week.
The refining capacity utilization rate unexpectedly fell by 0.6 percentage point from the previous week to 88.9%. Analysts were forecasting no change from the week prior.
U.S. oil inventories for the week ended Oct. 21:
Crude Gasoline Distillates Refinery Use
EIA data: +2.6 -1.5 +0.2 -0.6
Forecast: +0.6 -0.9 -1.1 unch
Note: Numbers in millions of barrels, with the exception of refinery use, which is in percentage points.
Write to Dan Molinski at dan.molinski@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
10-26-22 1103ET
