US commercial crude oil inventories decreased by 2.7% during the week ending May 19, according to data released by the Energy Information Administration (EIA) late Wednesday.
Inventories fell by around 12.5 million barrels to 455.2 million barrels, higher than the American Petroleum Institute's expectation of a drop of 6.7 million barrels.
Strategic petroleum reserves, which are excluded from commercial crude stocks, however, fell by about 1.6 million barrels to 358 million barrels last week, the data revealed.
Gasoline inventories also declined by around 2.1 million barrels to 216.3 million barrels over the same period.
- Crude production increases
EIA data showed that US crude oil imports decreased by 1.01 million barrels per day (bpd) to around 5.85 million bpd during the week ending May 12, while crude oil exports rose by 239,000 bpd to about 4.54 million bpd.
US crude oil production, meanwhile, rose by 134,000 bpd and stood at 12.73 million bpd over the same period.
In the Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO) released on May 9, the EIA forecast that crude oil output in the US would average 12.53 million bpd this year, up from 11.90 million bpd in 2022.
Crude oil output in the country in 2024 is forecast to reach 11.88 million bpd.
By Zeynep Beyza Kilic
Anadolu Agency