The Energy Information Administration in the US released its periodic report on the Petroleum Data for the week ending August 23rd on Wednesday afternoon, and the findings of the report surpassed the initial projections.
According to the data of the Energy Information Administration, US oil refinery inputs averaged 295 000 barrels per day less than the previous week's average, and the US commercial crude oil inventories (excluding those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve) decreased by 10.0 million barrels from last week, which surpassed the initial expectations greatly for only a 2.8 million decrease. [source]
As a result, the price of crude oil type WTI appreciated from 56.30 to 56.70 immediately after the release of the report, but then tumbled with 0.90 per cent to 55.75 in the several hours after that, owing to the lesser reported overall demand. According to the statistics, US crude oil imports averaged 5.9 million barrels per day last week, which is down by 1 290 000 barrels per day from the previous week.