Here is a weekly review for the week ends on December 23rd of the U.S. oil and petroleum market:
Crude oil Stockpiles
U.S. petroleum and crude oil stockpiles changed direction again and increased during last week by 3.1 million barrels, or by 0.18%. For the week ending on December 23rd petroleum and crude oil stockpiles reached 1,736.86 million barrels. The current oil stockpiles are below the quota from last year: the current crude oil stockpiles are 59.671 million barrels below oil stockpiles levels recorded during the same week in 2010.
U.S. Ending Stocks of crude oil also increased by 3.9 million barrels and reached 1,023.431 million barrels.
U.S. Ending Stocks of Total Gasoline on the other hand declined by 0.32% compared with last week’s stocks; it reached 217.714 million barrels.
The chart below presents the development of petroleum and oil stockpiles and WTI crude oil price during 2010 and 2011. During 2011, the lagged linear correlation between WTI oil price and current oil stockpiles was -0.147.
Petroleum production and imports (for the week of December 23rd)
U.S. oil refinery remained unchanged while inputs oil imports and oil production slightly decreased last week.
The four week average of U.S. production (million of barrels a day) for the week of December 23rd declined by 0.1% to 5.858; it is 4.8% above the average production at the same week in 2010;
Crude oil imports declined last week by 0.2% to 8.582 (for 4 week average) compared to the week of 16/12/2011; they were 0.1% above the average during the same time last year.
The crude oil refinery inputs (4 week average) reached 14.77. (million b/d), nearly unchanged compared with the previous week of 16/12/2011, and were 0.03% above the same time last year.
Below is a detailed recap of the information listed above (for the week of December 23rd):
Propane Stocks
Propane stocks declined by 7.9 thousand barrels and reached 56.178 million barrels.
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