Energy

Crude Oil Price Jumps on Inventory Drawdown

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The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released its weekly petroleum status report Wednesday morning. U.S. commercial crude inventories decreased by 4.1 million barrels last week, maintaining a total U.S. commercial crude inventory of 526.6 million barrels. The commercial crude inventory remains at historically high levels for this time of year according to the EIA.

Tuesday evening the American Petroleum Institute (API) reported that crude inventories fell by 3.9 million barrels in the week ending June 24. API also reported gasoline supplies fell by 42,000 barrels and distillate stockpiles fell by 83,000 barrels. For the same period, analysts had estimated a decrease of around 2.4 million barrels in crude inventories along with a decline of 58,000 barrels in gasoline supplies and a 14,000-barrel increase in distillates.

Total gasoline inventories increased by 1.4 million barrels last week, according to the EIA, and remain well above the upper limit of the five-year average range. Total motor gasoline supplied (the agency’s measure of consumption) averaged over 9.7 million barrels a day for the past four weeks, up by 1.8% compared with the same period a year ago.

Oil markets took a big following last week’s U.K. vote to leave the European Union. But after two days of sharp price drops, markets recovered about 3% on Tuesday and were on track for another daily gain ahead of this morning’s EIA report.

Much of the drop in crude prices was due to the suddenly stronger U.S. dollar. Because oil is priced in dollars, a stronger dollar puts downward pressure on crude prices. The British pound and the euro have both recovered some strength against the dollar since Monday, and that is putting more air under the price of crude.

Before the EIA report, benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude for August delivery traded up about 1.5% at around $48.50 a barrel and jumped to around $48.85 shortly after the report’s release. WTI crude settled at $47.85 on Tuesday. The 52-week range on August futures is $32.22 to $61.30.

Distillate inventories decreased by 1.8 million barrels last week and also remain well above the upper limit of the average range for this time of year. Distillate product supplied averaged over 3.8 million barrels a day over the past four weeks, down by 2.9% when compared with the same period last year. Distillate production averaged 5 million barrels a day last week,up more than 30% compared with the prior week.

For the past week, crude imports averaged about 7.6 million barrels a day, down by about 884,000 barrels a day compared with the previous week. Refineries were running at 93% of capacity, with daily input averaging 16.7 million barrels, about 190,000 barrels a day more than the previous week’s average.

According to AAA, the current national average pump price per gallon of regular gasoline is $2.294, down from $2.321 a week ago and down about 3 cents compared with the month-ago price. Last year at this time, a gallon of regular gasoline cost $2.773 on average in the United States.

Here is a look at how share prices for two blue-chip stocks and two exchange traded funds reacted to this latest report.

Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM) traded up 1.6%, at $92.36 in a 52-week range of $66.55 to $92.55. Over the past 12 months, Exxon stock has traded up about 11.6% and is down about 10.4% since August 2014, as of Tuesday’s close.

Chevron Corp. (NYSE: CVX) traded up about 2.2%, at $103.82 in a 52-week range of $69.58 to $104.45. As of Tuesday’s close, Chevron shares have added about 7.4% over the past 12 months and trade down about 22.3% since August 2014.

The United States Oil ETF (NYSEMKT: USO) traded up 2%, at $11.69 in a 52-week range of $7.67 to $19.58.

The Market Vectors Oil Services ETF (NYSEMKT: OIH) traded up about 2.6% at $28.77, in a 52-week range of $20.46 to $34.89.

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