US crude stock draw falls slightly short of expectations

The front-month ICE Brent contract has dropped by $0.76/bbl in the first 40 minutes after the official weekly oil figures from the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) were released today.

PHOTO: Oil refinery complex with big American flag displayed, and fumes coming out from the chimney. Getty Images

Commercial US crude inventories fell by a massive 10.58 million bbls on the week, to 422.92 million bbls on 25 August, which is the lowest level since December last year, according to the EIA's latest figures released today.

The weekly stock draw fell slightly short of the 11.49 million-bbls draw estimated by the American Petroleum Institute (API) yesterday.

The country's refinery utilisation dropped by 1.2 percentage points to 94% in the latest week. 

Gasoline stocks dropped by 214,000 bbls over the week, to 217 million bbls.

Distillate stocks, which include diesel and gasoil, increased by 1.24 million bbls to 118 million bbls, which was also the highest in five weeks.

By Debarati Bhattacharjee

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