The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported on Thursday that U.S. crude stocks rose, while gasoline and distillate inventories fell due to seasonal refinery maintenance, which led to lower refining activity.
For the week ending February 14, crude stockpiles increased by 4.6 million barrels, reaching 432.5 million barrels. This was higher than analysts’ expectations of a 3.1 million-barrel rise.
Crude oil stocks at Cushing, Oklahoma, the delivery hub, saw a 1.5 million-barrel increase during the same period.
Following the report, U.S. crude futures and global crude prices rose. By 12:14 p.m. EST (1314 GMT), West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude was up 75 cents, trading at $73 per barrel, while Brent crude gained 90 cents.
John Kilduff of Again Capital in New York noted that low refinery utilization rates are contributing to the backlog in crude supplies. He also explained that this low production rate is partly to blame for the decline in gasoline inventories.
Refineries have not been producing as much gasoline as expected.
Utilization rates dropped by 0.1 percentage points to 84.9% during the week.
Gasoline stocks fell by 151,000 barrels, dropping to 247.9 million barrels, a larger decrease than the 6,000 barrels expected.
Distillate stocks, which include diesel and heating oil, declined by 2.1 million barrels to 116.6 million barrels, surpassing the expected 1.6 million-barrel drop.
The EIA also reported a 472,000-barrel-per-day increase in net U.S. crude exports last week, while imports decreased by 961,000 barrels.
Reporting by Arathy S. Somasekhar, Houston. Editing by Marguerita C. Choy.
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