EIA reported a draw of -562 MBbls in U.S. crude-oil inventories for the week ending 12/18/2020. This was smaller than the average estimate of -2899 MBbls as reported by Bloomberg.
Prices were down five minutes following the announcement, to $47.57, from $47.64 just before 9:30am.
Inventories for the US are now at a surplus of 52.701 MBbls to last year and a surplus of 46.99 MBbls to the five-year average.
