U.S. crude stocks, gasoline and distillate inventories fell last week, the Energy Information Administration said on Wednesday.
Crude inventories fell by 2.3 million barrels to 457.2 million barrels in the week ended May 1, the EIA said, compared with analysts’ expectations in a Reuters poll for a 3.3 million-barrel draw.
Crude stocks at the Cushing, Oklahoma, delivery hub fell by 648,000 barrels in the week, the EIA said.
Refinery crude runs fell by 42,000 barrels per day in the week, the EIA said, while utilization rates rose by 0.5 percentage points in the week.
U.S. gasoline stocks fell by 2.5 million barrels in the week to 219.8 million barrels, the EIA said, compared with analysts’ expectations in a Reuters poll for a 2.1 million-barrel draw.
Distillate stockpiles, which include diesel and heating oil, fell by 1.3 million barrels in the week to 102.3 million barrels, versus expectations for a 2.4 million-barrel drop, the EIA data showed.
Net U.S. crude imports rose by 1.42 million barrels per day, EIA said.
(Reporting by Liz Hampton in Denver and Siddharth Cavale in New York; )