Oil Slides Following DOE Report
Oil declined $1.50 to below $77 a barrel Wednesday following the Department of Energy’s weekly inventory report that showed crude inventories rose by 2 million barrels last week, Bloomberg reported.
Crude futures fell to finish the trading day at $76.35 on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Oil topped $77 last Wednesday for the first time since May 6 and has closed near or above that level every day in the past week.
DOE said in its weekly report that distillate inventories, which include diesel fuel, rose by 300,000 barrels for the week ended Saturday, while gasoline supplies fell 800,000 barrels.
The jump in oil inventories was in contrast to economists’ forecasts of an 800,000-barrel drop, Bloomberg reported.
The International Energy Agency said in a separate report Wednesday that oil demand will slow over the next five years.
