Crude oil and refined product futures were all showing losses Thursday morning despite surprisingly bullish data on U.S. energy supply and demand released late in the morning.
Crude oil losses were approaching $1/bbl at about 11:30 a.m. ET, with the February contract for U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude sinking 84cts to $73.27/bbl, about 70cts off the morning’s low. The March contract was 79cts lower to $73.55/bbl. The February contract for European benchmark Brent crude was $1.01 lower to $78.64/bbl, while March prices were $1.05 in the red to $78.49/bbl.
Refined product contracts were also off morning lows, but well away from earlier highs.
The January NYMEX RBOB contract was 2.1cts lower to $2.1340/gal, about 1.5cts above the morning’s low, while February prices shed 2.26cts to $2.1393/gal. The front-month ULSD contract stepped back 1.53cts to $2.6086/gal, about 1.40cts off the low, while March prices were 1.43cts lighter to $2.5882/gal.
Earlier in the morning the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released its weekly Petroleum Status Report, which showed a 6.9 million bbl decline in U.S. crude oil inventories–due mostly to a large end-of-year drop in Gulf Coast supplies that appeared aimed at reducing tax liability.
Gasoline inventories fell by 600,000 bbl, placing supplies 2% below seasonal averages, while distillate inventories rose by 800,000 bbl, with stocks 9% lower than where they normally are this time of year.
U.S. refinery utilization was at 93.3%, up about a percentage point from the previous week.
EIA also reported strong gasoline demand for the holiday week ending Dec. 22 at nearly 9.17 million b/d, up about 400,000 b/d on the week. Distillate demand also rose, at 3.97 million b/d about 150,000 b/d higher than the previous week.
This content was created by Oil Price Information Service, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. OPIS is run independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.
–Reporting by Steve Cronin, [email protected]; Editing by Andrew Atwal, [email protected]
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