Crude oil inventories in the United States fell this week by 6.490 million barrels for the week ending May 17, according to The American Petroleum Institute API. For the week prior, the API reported a 2.48 million barrel hike in crude inventories. On Tuesday, the Department of Energy DoE reported that crude oil inventories in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve SPR rose by 0.5 million barrels as of May 24. Inventories are now at 369.
40 per barrel from this time last week. The U.S. benchmark WTI was also trading down on the day at 0.98% to $79.05 —essentially flat week over week. Gasoline inventories fell this week as well, by 452,000 barrels, after last week’s 2.088 million barrel increase. As of last week, gasoline inventories were about 2% below the five-year average for this time of year, according to the latest EIA data. Distillate inventories rose this week by 2.