Oil Tops $100 Before Receding
Crude oil prices topped $100 Thursday before receding to close at $99.18 a barrel, short of Wednesday’s closing-price record, Bloomberg reported.
Futures reached $100.09 on Thursday, an intraday record for crude, Bloomberg said. Wednesday’s closing price of $99.62 on the New York Mercantile Exchange was a closing-price record.
Meanwhile, the Department of Energy reported Thursday that crude inventories fell by 4.1 million barrels last week, a bigger drop than analysts had expected, Bloomberg said.
Gasoline stockpiles gained 2 million barrels and distillates — which include diesel and heating oil — rose by 570,000 barrels, DOE said in its weekly inventory report.
Both of those gains were bigger than analysts’ forecasts, and gas stockpiles were at the highest level since March, Bloomberg said.
