U.S. commercial crude oil inventories, excluding those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), increased by 4.1 million barrels from the week ending January 31 to the week ending February 7, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) highlighted in its latest weekly petroleum status report.
The report, which was released on February 12 and included data for the week ending February 7, showed that crude oil stocks, not including the SPR, stood at 427.9 million barrels on February 7, 423.8 million barrels on January 31, and 439.5 million barrels on February 9, 2024. Crude oil in the SPR stood at 395.3 million barrels on February 7, 395.1 million barrels on January 31, and 358.8 million barrels on February 9, 2024, the report highlighted.
Total petroleum stocks – including crude oil, total motor gasoline, fuel ethanol, kerosene type jet fuel, distillate fuel oil, residual fuel oil, propane/propylene, and other oils – stood at 1.607 billion barrels on February 7, the report revealed. This figure was up 1.5 million barrels week on week and up 16.2 million barrels year on year, the report outlined.
“At 427.9 million barrels, U.S. crude oil inventories are about four percent below the five year average for this time of year,” the EIA said in its latest weekly petroleum status report.
“Total motor gasoline inventories decreased by 3.0 million barrels from last week and are one percent below the five year average for this time of year,” it added.
“Finished gasoline inventories and blending components inventories both decreased last week. Distillate fuel inventories increased by 0.1 million barrels last week and are about 11 percent below the five year average for this time of year,” it continued.
“Propane/propylene inventories decreased by 2.6 million barrels from last week and are slightly below the five year average for this time of year,” it went on to state.
In the report, the EIA said U.S. crude oil refinery inputs averaged 15.4 million barrels per day during the week ending February 7. The organization pointed out that this was 82,000 barrels per day more than the previous week’s average.
“Refineries operated at 85.0 percent of their operable capacity last week,” the EIA said in the report.
“Gasoline production increased last week, averaging 9.3 million barrels per day. Distillate fuel production decreased last week, averaging 4.5 million barrels per day,” it added.
U.S. crude oil imports averaged 6.3 million barrels per day last week, the EIA noted in its report. It highlighted that this was a decrease of 606,000 barrels per day from the previous week.
“Over the past four weeks, crude oil imports averaged about 6.6 million barrels per day, 7.6 percent more than the same four-week period last year,” the EIA said in the report.
“Total motor gasoline imports (including both finished gasoline and gasoline blending components) last week averaged 319,000 barrels per day, and distillate fuel imports averaged 245,000 barrels per day,” it added.
Total products supplied over the last four-week period averaged 20.3 million barrels a day, up by 2.8 percent from the same period last year, the EIA stated in its report.
“Over the past four weeks, motor gasoline product supplied averaged 8.3 million barrels a day, up by 0.9 percent from the same period last year,” the EIA added.
“Distillate fuel product supplied averaged 4.2 million barrels a day over the past four weeks, up by 13.6 percent from the same period last year. Jet fuel product supplied was up 4.4 percent compared with the same four-week period last year,” it went on to state.
In a report sent to Rigzone by the Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB (SEB) team on Thursday morning, Ole R. Hvalbye, a commodities analyst at the company, highlighted that the EIA report “revealed an increase of 4.1 million barrels in U.S. crude oil inventories for the previous week” and said “this build exceeded the consensus estimate of 2.5 million barrels”.
“As of last week, total U.S. crude inventories stand at 428 million barrels, which represents a decrease of 12 million barrels compared to the same week last year,” Hvalbye pointed out in the report.
In a market analysis sent to Rigzone late Wednesday, Quasar Elizundia, Expert Research Strategist at Pepperstone, said “West Texas Intermediate (WTI) recorded its biggest drop since January, falling approximately 2.5 percent, partially affected by the latest report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration”.
“The report revealed an unexpected increase in U.S. crude inventories of 4.1 million barrels, bringing stockpiles to 427.9 million barrels,” Elizundia added.
“This buildup comes immediately after last week’s report showed the largest inventory surge since February 2024, with an additional 8.6 million barrels,” Elizundia went on to state.
Source: By Andreas Exarheas from Rigzone.com