Crude Stronger As US To Refill Strategic Reserve

Oil prices ended the NY session higher after bouncing off an earlier dip on the back of the announcement to refill the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR). WTI rose 0.5% and is currently trading around $73.55/bbl and Brent rose 0.4% to $77.28. Oil doesn’t currently seem affected by the unsuccessful debt-ceiling talks. The USD index rose 0.3% ahead of today’s US CPI data.

• WTI dipped to an intraday low of $71.34 after spending most of Tuesday in a narrow range. It rebounded when the US announced that the sale of 140mn barrels from the SPR would be cancelled and it would be refilled later this year once maintenance was completed, this is likely to put a floor under oil prices. WTI is currently close to the intraday high of $73.78 and is approaching initial resistance at $73.93, the April 28 low.
• Wildfires in Alberta are now expected to impact 500kbd of oil production up from 234kbd.
• Bloomberg is reporting that US crude inventories rose 3.62mn barrels last week according to people familiar with the API data. Gasoline rose 399k while distillate fell 3.945mn.