At the end of the week ended January 27, commercial reserves increased by 4.1 million barrels, while analysts anticipated a drop of one million barrels.
Commercial crude oil reserves rose sharply last week in the United States, as the market expected a contraction, according to figures released on Wednesday by the United States Energy Information Agency (EIA), a movement linked to the acceleration of imports.
At the end of the week ended January 27, these commercial stocks rose by some 4.1 million barrels, while analysts anticipated a drop of one million barrels, according to a consensus established by the Bloomberg agency.
This is the sixth consecutive week of increases in commercial stocks, which are now at their highest since June 2021.
The publication was poorly received by the market. On the rise before the release of the weekly report, the price of a barrel of American West Texas Intermediate (WTI) for delivery in March fell by 0.70% around 4:10 p.m. GMT, to 78.32 dollars.
The marked increase in crude reserves is largely explained by the jump in imports (+23%) and the fall in exports (-26%). Net imports (imports deducted from exports) were thus 18 million barrels higher than the previous week.
For Matt Smith of Kpler, the surge in imports is due to the recommissioning, after a leak in Kansas, of the Keystone pipeline, which transports Canadian oil to the United States.
More marginally, the rise in the level of commercial stocks is linked to a slight slowdown in the activity of refineries, whose utilization rate fell to 85.7%, against 86.1% the previous week.
The end of January and the month of February traditionally correspond to a maintenance period for refineries, which effectively limits their capacities.
For the third week in a row, the American strategic oil reserves remained unchanged, witnessing the decision of the American government not to use these stocks immediately after having drained them for 16 months.
Last week also saw a rebound in demand for refined products (+3.4%), driven by gasoline, kerosene and propane. Gasoline demand notably rose above its level of last year at the same time.
Matt Smith nevertheless points out that gasoline reserves have increased by 2.6 million barrels, more than expected by analysts, which is likely to lower prices.
As for production, it remained unchanged at 12.2 million barrels per day.
