Crude oil prices remain lower after Fed rate decision

The price of crude oil was lower on Wednesday after the US Energy Information Administration released its weekly US inventories data, which showed that crude oil and distillates stockpiles were up last week and while gasoline stockpiles were down, they didn’t fall by as much as had been anticipated.

US supplies of crude oil were up by 800,000 barrels in the week ending 20 June against an expected decline of 1.7 million barrels.

Meanwhile, gasoline inventories were only down by 100,000 barrels and distillates stockpiles jumped by 2.8 million barrels, much more than had been expected.

Before the Federal Reserve voted to keep interest rates at 2 percent for the time being, August contracts for West Texas Intermediate crude was down $3.30 to $133.70 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, while after the decision crude oil remained $2.19 lower to $134.81 per barrel.

WTI had been down as much as $5 per barrel at one point.

Meanwhile, Brent crude for August delivery dropped $3.02 to $133.44 per barrel.

Nymex July gasoline futures dropped 8 cents to $3.37 per gallon, while at-the-pump prices for regular unleaded gasoline in the United States dropped 0.2 cent overnight to $4.067 per gallon, still over $1 higher than last year at the same time, while diesel was up 0.1 cent from yesterday’s average to $4.771 per gallon, $1.86 higher than last year’s prices.

High pump prices for gasoline are taking their toll, with demand reported down 2.1 percent last week.