US crude stock draw produces short-lived price recovery

17 June 2009 16:07  [Source: ICIS news]

LONDON (ICIS news)--The crude oil markets initially rose by about 40 cents on Wednesday, wiping out a little of the earlier losses, when this week’s US stock figures showed a much larger-than-expected crude draw.

However, the gains proved very short-lived and prices soon fell to new lows for the day as an unexpected gasoline build started to come into play.

July NYMEX light sweet crude futures rose from around $69.60/bbl before the figures from the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) were published to hit $70/bbl, which was a loss of 47 cents from Tuesday’s close.

However, it then lost ground again and at 14:40 GMT, July NYMEX crude was trading around $69.35/bbl, down $1.12 from Tuesday’s close of $70.47/bbl, having hit a low of $69.00/bbl.

On ICE futures, August Brent also briefly regained some ground, rising from around $69.55/bbl before the figures were published to around $69.85/bbl.

At 14:40 GMT, August Brent was trading around $69.40/bbl, down 84 cents from Tuesday’s close of $70.24/bbl, having hit a low of $69.02/bbl.

Analysts’ predictions for this week’s US stock figures were that they would show draws on crude stocks of about 1.7m bbl and on gasoline of around 100,000 bbl, but a build on distillate of around 800,000 bbl.

The API figures were published late on Tuesday.

US stocks (million bbl)	w/e 12.06.09
	EIA	Change	API	Change
Crude	357.7	-3.9	356.6	-1.3
Gasoline	205.0	+3.4	207.7	+2.1
RFG	2.2	n/c	2.6	n/c
Distillate	150.0	+0.3	151.5	+0.9
Heating Oil	40.6	+0.6	40.6	n/c
Jet Kerosene	41.6	+0.6	41.6	+0.6

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By: Tony Dillon
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