Oil Pops After Greater Than Expected Crude Inventory Draw

Oil prices staged a modest bounce following yesterday’s sharp drop, following the latest DOE Crude Inventory data, which showed a bigger than expected Crude and Distillate draw offset by a larger than expected Gasoline build while Cushing also increased.

DOE:

• Crude -7.17MM, Exp. -2.5MM
• Gasoline +1.29MM, -1.6MM
• Distillates -1.732MM, -550K
• Cushing +836K
• Production 11.5MM, +100kb/d

The 7.2MM draw was substantially greater than the data disclosed yesterday by API:

• Crude -4.045MM
• Gasoline +2.711MM
• Distillate -1.961MM
• Cushing +2.128MM

Visually:

More importantly, US crude production remains controlled for now even as rig counts and prices rise.

WTI popped modestly on the bigger than expected draw only to reverse most of the gain.

It is worth noting that anyone looking for the impact of Hurricane Ida – which came on shore on Saturday – in the data will have to wait until next week’s DOE report, which will capture any resulting dislocations.

The latest data comes as the OPEC+ virtual meeting is taking place in the background, although it does not appear there will be any major surprises there: as Bloomberg notes, the JMMC has recommended sticking to the supply-hike plan which means another 400K b/d in output will soon be added to the total amid hopes that the current Delta variant slowdown fades away soon enough.