Nymex down as oil supply rises

Nymex WTI was lower in early trading on Thursday, hitting a seven-week low of $50.06 per barrel, before going up to $50.37 on May delivery contracts.

Brent was also up, rising 40 cents to $50.88 on May deliveries and to 42 cents to $51.80 on June contracts.

The rise came in response to U.S. Energy Department data on crude oil stockpiles released Thursday.

The good news was that crude oil supplies were up 3.6 percent last week, with a total supply of 320.7 million barrels on hand.

This was the ninth week in a row that supplies have gone up, and the largest stockpile since June 2002.

The not-so-good news was that the operating capacities of U.S. oil refineries was down to 91 percent, from 93.7 percent last week.

The fact that U.S. gasoline use was up 4.1 percent for the last four weeks compared to the same period last year, with the summer driving season still to begin, also caused concern.

Thursday’s prices are still lower than the record highs reached on Monday of last week, when Nymax reached $58.28 per barrel of crude oil and Brent hit $57.65 per barrel.

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