Oil Surges Past $123 a Barrel
Oil prices continued to surge, pushing past $123 a barrel for the first time Wednesday, even as a Department of Energy report showed supplies improved last week, Bloomberg reported.
Crude futures rose to a record $123.80 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, following DOE’s weekly report that showed supplies gained 5.7 million barrels last week, about four times above analysts’ estimates, Bloomberg said.
Futures closed at $123.53 a barrel, a closing-price record on the Nymex, while gasoline and heating oil futures, a close proxy to diesel, also reached records Wednesday, Bloomberg said.
Distillate inventories, which include diesel, fell by 100,000 barrels last week, while gasoline supplies rose by 800,000 barrels, both of which were below analysts’ expectations, Bloomberg reported.
