US stock news halts crude slide with $1.50 gain

19 March 2008 15:08  [Source: ICIS news]

LONDON (ICIS news)--The crude markets rose by about $1.50 on Wednesday when the week’s US stock figures from the EIA showed a much smaller crude build than anticipated, plus a large draw on gasoline rather than the expected build.

With distillates also showing a larger than predicted draw in the EIA (Energy Information Administration) figures, the bearish mood was moderated.

The April NYMEX light sweet crude futures contract expires at the end of the day, so the focus switched to the following month.

May NYMEX futures rose from around $105.00 before the figures were published to around $106.50/bbl, a loss of $2.00 from Tuesday’s close.

However, it then gave back much of the gains and at 14:45 GMT, May NYMEX crude was trading around $105.55, down $2.95 from Tuesday’s close of $109.42.

On ICE Futures, May Brent also gained ground, rising from around $102.60 before the figures were published to around $103.75. At 14:45 GMT, May Brent was trading around $103.00, down $2.56 from Tuesday’s close of $105.56.

Analysts’ predictions for this week’s US stock figures were that they would show builds on crude stocks of about 2.3m bbl and on gasoline of around 400,000 bbl, but a draw on distillate of around 1.5m bbl.

US stocks (million bbl)	w/e 14.03.08
	EIA	Change	API	Change
Crude	311.8	+0.2	307.7	+2.5
Gasoline	232.5	-3.5	218.5	-0.8
RFG	1.3	+0.2	1.1	+0.2
Distillate	113.5	-2.9	112.7	-1.6
Heating oil	26.9	-3.2	28.8	-1.6
Kerosene	39.4	+0.5	39.4	+0.9

Sources: EIA, American Petroleum Institute

By: Tony Dillon
+44 20 8652 3214

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