Brent falls amid US crude stock build

Front-month ICE Brent crude futures dropped by $0.48/bbl in the first hour after the official weekly oil figures from the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) were released today.

PHOTO: An oil pumpjack with the US flag in the background. Getty Images

Commercial crude oil inventories in the US rose by 3.59 million bbls to 461 million bbls in the week ending 21 June.

The stocks rose amid lower US crude oil exports and reduced refinery capacity utilisation. The country's crude oil exports dropped by 508,000 b/d to 3.91 million b/d on the week.

Refinery crude runs dropped by 233,000 b/d as the country's refinery utilisation fell by 1.3 percentage points to 92.2% last week.

Gasoline stocks rose by 2.65 million bbls on the week to 234 million bbls – the highest in fifteen weeks.

Distillate stocks, which include diesel and gasoil, dropped by 377,000 bbls to 121 million bbls.

By Debarati Bhattacharjee

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