Oil Rises to Record as U.S. Reports Gasoline Supplies Fell
Oil Rises to Record as U.S. Reports Gasoline Supplies Fell
Aug. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Crude oil in New York jumped to a record $64.35 a barrel after the government reported U.S. gasoline inventories fell for the sixth straight week amid strengthening demand.
Motor-fuel stockpiles dropped 2.1 million barrels to 203.1 million last week, the Energy Department reported. Gasoline demand was up 1.4 percent for the four weeks ended Aug. 5 compared with the same period a year earlier. The decline in motor fuel overshadowed an unexpected gain in crude-oil inventories.
``It looks like the gasoline markets are still quite tight,'' said Brian Hicks, who helps oversee $565 million at U.S. Global Investors in San Antonio. ``At first glance, it's somewhat bearish if you look just at the build in crude oil inventories.''
Crude oil for September delivery rose $1.13, or 1.8 percent, to $64.20 a barrel at 12:40 p.m. on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Prices are 44 percent higher than a year ago. Futures touched $64.35 a barrel, the highest since the Nymex contract began in 1983.
The Energy Department report on inventories and production was released at 10:30 a.m. in Washington.
In London, September Brent crude-oil futures also reached a record. Prices rose $1.27, or 2.1 percent, to $63.25 a barrel on the International Petroleum Exchange. The futures earlier today reached an all-time high of $63.41 a barrel. Brent trading began in 1988.
Oil Supplies Jump
Crude oil supplies rose 2.8 million barrels to 320.8 million in the week ended Aug. 5, the Energy Department said. Stockpiles were expected to fall 1 million barrels, according to the median estimate of 10 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.
Oil imports rose to 11.1 million barrels a day last week, the highest in a year. Refineries operated at 95 percent of capacity, down 0.8 percentage point from the previous week.
``We've seen a slowdown in refinery utilization tied to outages and that allowed crude oil to'' increase, said Jason Schenker, an economist at Wachovia Corp. in Charlotte. ``Higher imports also helped.''
Refinery units at Chevron Corp., BP Plc, Valero Energy Corp., Exxon Mobil Corp., Sunoco Inc. and ConocoPhillips had unplanned shutdowns in recent weeks.
Gasoline supplies are down 2.5 percent compared with the week ended Aug. 6, 2004, according to government figures.
Gasoline for September delivery rose 6.36 cents, or 3.5 percent, to $1.886 a gallon in New York. The futures earlier touched an all-time high of $1.888 a gallon. The contract debuted in 1984.
The national gasoline average at the pump rose 2.2 cents to a record $2.376 a gallon yesterday, according to the AAA, the former American Automobile Association. Prices are up 27 percent from the average $1.867 a gallon a year earlier.
Crude oil accounts for about half the cost of a gallon of retail gasoline.
To contact the reporter on this story: Heesun Wee in New York at hwee1@bloomberg.net.
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