Crude oil inventories in the U.S. increased for the fourth consecutive week, the country's Energy Information Administration (EIA) data revealed Wednesday.
Commercial crude oil stocks in the country rose by 8 million barrels, or 1.7 percent, to reach 476.6 million barrels for the week ending Oct. 16, from 468.6 million barrels from the previous week ending Oct. 9, according to the EIA.
For the same period, strategic petroleum reserves in the country remained unchanged.
This marked the fourth straight week crude oil inventories have increased since they fell for the week ending Sept. 18, according to the EIA data.
'The increase in oil stocks came despite a slight rebound in the volume of crude processed by U.S. refineries,' London-based Capital Economics' U.S. Weekly Petroleum Status Report said Wednesday.
'This may indicate that we have reached the nadir of the U.S. autumn maintenance season,' said Thomas Pugh, a commodities economist at Capital Economics and author of the report.
'Refiners typically schedule maintenance in the late summer after demand has peaked,' he reminded.
Refineries are considered to have some of the largest demand for crude oil. When they are in maintenance, their demand falls, resulting in a buildup of crude oil inventories and a decrease in oil prices.
Indeed, the price of the global benchmark Brent crude oil fell below $48 per barrel mark late Thursday, after the EIA announced weekly crude oil builds, but managed to climb as high as $48.66 per barrel on Thursday.
Meanwhile, crude oil imports of the U.S. rose by 156,000 barrels per day (bpd) to reach 7.47 million bpd for the week ending Oct. 16, from 7.31 million bpd the week ending Oct. 9.
In addition, domestic oil production in the U.S. remained unchanged at 9.1 million bpd during the same period. Oil production in the country fell around 500,000 barrels per day on average, after reaching almost its highest level since the 1970s in April this year at 9.6 million bpd.
Due to low oil prices and with U.S. producers under pressure, the EIA expects domestic oil production to decline to an average of 8.86 million bpd in 2016, from 9.25 million bpd on average this year, according to its Short-Term Energy and Winter Fuels Outlook.
'We still think the bigger picture is that falling oil production and increases in demand for oil products should put upward pressure on crude oil prices over the next year,' Pugh said.
By Ovunc Kutlu
Anadolu Agency
ovunc.kutlu@aa.com.tr