Weekly EIA Petroleum & Ethanol Inventory Comment
<div class=\"default-font-wrapper\" style=\"line-height: 1;font-size: 12pt; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif;\"><div style=\"line-height: 1;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif;\">Weekly EIA Petroleum & Ethanol Inventory Comment<br id=\"isPasted\"> <br>The EIA headline petroleum data played-out along similar themes as the API report yesterday. Crude Oil stocks added +0.8 million barrels (SPR up +0.3), gasoline stocks slipped -2.0 million barrels, and distillate inventory dipped -1.9 million. Compared to the year ago week, total crude oil stocks are +1.8% higher, commercial crude stocks are -3.7% lower, gasoline stocks are +2.9% higher, and distillate inventory is -5.0% lower.<br> <br>The report details again held mixed feature. Gasoline product supplied remains surprisingly weak, bouncing less than +1% wk/wk, and would lag the year ago period by more than -2%. Distillate product supplied (a proxy for demand) slipped -3% off a strong prior week, though relative to last year it is up a healthy +10%. Refiner utilization slipped -0.4% to 86.3% in use. U.S. crude oil production was little changed wk/wk at levels that are +3% above year earlier. Cushing stocks eased -0.7 million barrels lower to 25.1 mil bbl, well below last year’s 33.0 and two years ago at 32.8 million.<br> <br>The ethanol data in the weekly EIA was mildly friendly but lacked the fireworks many (including us) were expecting. Weekly ethanol production slipped -1% wk/wk; the resulting 1.012 mil bbl/day rate would yield 298 million gallons of ethanol over the week, consuming 102 million bushels of total feedstock. Sustained over a marketing year, such a rate would utilize 5.3 billion bushels of corn. Blender demand rebounded nicely (+3%), despite soft gasoline product supplied. Reported ethanol exports relaxed after a strong prior week (137k bbl/day vs. 174k prior). Ethanol stocks featured a small draw of -0.8% to 26.8 million barrels (1.126 billion gallons). Regionally, stocks were lower East Coast and Midwest (off record high levels), unchanged on the West Coast, and slightly higher at the Gulf Coast.</span></div><br><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif;\">KJ</span></div>