US Crude Oil Inventories Drop 5.2 Million Barrels

The American Petroleum Institute estimated that United States crude oil inventories fell by 5.267 million barrels for the week ending October 30. This decline follows a previous weekly drop of 2.031 million barrels, contributing to a larger trend where commercial crude oil inventories, excluding the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, have decreased by more than 64 million barrels over the last 29 weeks and 12 million barrels this year.

To support commercial inventories, 400,000 barrels were drawn from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve during the week ending October 30. This action reduced the reserve to 282.2 million barrels, a level approaching the operational minimum of 250-300 million barrels.

Despite the inventory declines, U.S. production rose to 13.992 million barrels per day for the week ending October 23. Market prices remained mixed as of Wednesday afternoon, with Brent crude trading at $104.32 and WTI at $97.24.