The recent Energy Information Administration petroleum report examines the shift in recent years in the U.S. policy in regards to ethanol as the IS has shifted from a prime importer to an ethanol exporter.
Here is a weekly review for the week ends on August 19th of the U.S. oil and petroleum market including: gasoline and crude oil prices; petroleum, oil and gasoline stockpiles:
Petroleum Stocks
U.S. Petroleum and oil stocks nearly didn’t change as they have decreased last week by 827 thousand barrels, or by 0.05%; that being said, this weekly fall was the fourth straight week that crude oil stockpiles have fallen. For the week ending on August 19th crude oil stocks reached 1,794 million barrels.
U.S. Ending Stocks of crude oil sharply fell by 7 million barrels and reached 1,058 million barrels; U.S. Ending Stocks of Total Gasoline on the other hand, inclined by 0.64% compared with last week’s stocks; it reached 211.4 million barrels.
The chart below presents the petroleum and oil stockpiles levels compared to the WTI crude oil prices during 2010 and 2011. It shows there is an apparent weak lagged effect between the changes in oil stockpiles and WTI spot oil prices. During 2011, the lagged WTI oil price and current oil stockpiles weekly percent changes have a -0.175 linear correlation.
Petroleum production and imports (for the week of August 19th)
The four week average of US production (million of barrels a day) for the week of August 19th reached 5.551, which is higher by 1% compared with the previous week’s, and is 3.1% above the average production at the same time in 2010;
Crude oil imports declined again by 2.8% last week and reached 9.082 (for 4 week average) compared to the week of 12/8/2011; they were 5.7% below the average during the same time last year.
The crude oil refinery inputs (4 week average) reached 15.549 (million b/d), an increase of 0.5% compared with the previous week of 12/8/2011, and were 2.3% above the same time last year.
Below is a detailed recap of the information listed above (for the week of August 19th):
Crude oil price, Gasoline and Diesel prices for the week ending on August 19th
The average U.S. gasoline retail price fell for the third consecutive time by two cents per gallon compared with the previous week’s average; it reached $3.58 /g, which is $0.88 /g higher than the same period in 2010.
The national average Diesel prices also declined for the fourth consecutive week by two and a half cents compared with the previous week; it reached $3.81/g. which is $0.85/g higher than last year’s average price at same time.
A detailed analysis on crude oil price for the week of August 19 is herein.
Propane
Propane stocks keep on stocking up; last week, their stocks inclined by 1,663 thousand barrels – a 3.3% increase – reaching 52.045 million barrels.
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