Crude oil futures erased losses after the U.S. Energy Department said stockpiles rose 832,000 barrels last week to 345.7 million, a smaller gain than analysts forecast.
Supplies of crude oil were forecast to grow 1.5 million barrels.
Gasoline inventories fell 396,000 barrels to 229.5 million last week, the Energy Department said today. Stockpiles were forecast to slip 1.6 million barrels, according to the median of 10 analyst estimates in a Bloomberg News survey.
Distillate supplies, which include heating oil and diesel, decreased 1.94 million barrels to 139.5 million. Stockpiles were estimated to fall 1.65 million barrels.
Crude oil for April delivery rose one cent to $104.71 U.S. a barrel late Wednesday morning on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Oil traded at $104.49 U.S. a barrel before release of the inventory report at 10:30 a.m.
Futures also rose after companies in America added 216,000 workers to their payrolls in February, according to data today from Roseland, New Jersey-based ADP Employer Services.
The median projection of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News called for an advance of 215,000. ADP reported a revised 173,000 increase in January.
Companies in the U.S. are poised to boost employment as confidence in the economy climbed to the highest level in a year, a quarterly survey of chief financial officers showed today. A gauge of executives’ optimism in the world’s largest economy rose to 59.2 from January through March from 53.3 the prior period, according to a report issued today by Duke University/CFO Magazine.
The U.S. was the world’s biggest oil-consuming country, responsible for 21% of global oil use in 2010, according to BP Plc’s Statistical Review of World Energy released on June 8. The European Union’s 27 members accounted for 16% of world demand in 2010, BP figures show.
