Crude Oil Price Slips on More Imports and Refining

Tuesday evening the American Petroleum Institute (API) reported that crude inventories rose by 1.8 million barrels and gasoline inventories also rose in the week ending May 29. For the same period, analysts had estimated a decrease of 1.6 million barrels in crude inventories.

Total gasoline inventories decreased by 300,000 barrels last week according to the EIA, but have moved above the upper limit of the five-year average range. Total motor gasoline supplied (the agency’s measure of consumption) averaged about 9.3 million barrels a day for the past four weeks, up by 1.1% compared with the same period a year ago.

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This week’s most important event, at least as far as the oil markets are concerned, is the OPEC meeting that begins Friday. The cartel is not expected to change its official quota of 30 million barrels a day, nor is it likely to reduce actual production from more than 31 million barrels a day. That will not be particularly welcome news in the United States, where oil prices around $60 a barrel are stirring up some drillers to begin drilling again.

Before the EIA report, West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude for July delivery traded down about 0.7% at around $60.80 a barrel. The WTI price inched higher to around $61.00 (down 0.6% for the day) immediately after the report was released. The 52-week range on WTI futures is $47.46 to $97.27. Within 10 minutes following the EIA report, crude had dropped back to around $60.70.

Distillate inventories increased by 3.8 million barrels last week and have moved to the middle of the average range for this time of year. Distillate product supplied averaged over 4 million barrels a day over the past four weeks, down by 1.6% when compared with the same period last year. Distillate production averaged over 5 million barrels a day last week, up about 100,000 barrels a day compared with the prior week’s production.

For the past week, crude imports averaged nearly 7.4 million barrels a day, up by 677,000 barrels a day compared with the previous week. Refineries were running at 93.2% of capacity, with daily input of around 16.4 million barrels, about 43,000 barrels a day below the previous week’s average.

According to AAA, the current national average pump price per gallon of regular gasoline is $2.756, up from $2.739 a week ago and $2.615 a month ago. Last year at this time a gallon of regular cost $3.665 on average in the United States.

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Here is a look at how share prices for two blue-chip stocks and two exchange traded funds reacted to this latest report.

Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM) traded up about 0.45%, at $85.52 in a 52-week range of $82.68 to $104.76. Year to date, Exxon stock traded down about 7.5%, and it is down about 11.6% since early November, as of Tuesday’s close.

Chevron Corp. (NYSE: CVX) traded up 0.44% to $103.06, in a 52-week range of $98.88 to $135.10. As of the most recent close, Chevron shares have also dropped about 8.2% year to date and trade down about 14.1% since early November.

The United States Oil ETF (NYSEMKT: USO) traded down about 1%, at $20.50 in a 52-week range of $15.61 to $39.44.

The Market Vectors Oil Services ETF (NYSEMKT: OIH) traded down about 1.3%, at $36.58 in a 52-week range of $31.51 to $58.01.