Investing.com - Crude prices gained in Asia on Wednesday after a surprise drop in industry estimates of U.S. inventories, but the market cautious ahead of official figures.
On the New York Mercantile Exchange crude futures for June delivery jumped 1.01% to $48.14 a barrel, while on London's Intercontinental Exchange, Brent edged up 0.12% to $51.03 a barrel.
U.S. crude inventories fell a more than expected 4.16 million barrels at the end of last week, the American Petroleum Institute (API) said Tuesday, with gasoline supplies showing a surprise draw of 1.93 million barrels and distillates fell 440,000 barrels.
The industry figures are followed Wednesday by official data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA). The two sets of figures often diverge and have in the past two weeks whipsawed the market. Analysts, in upward revised estimates, expect crude oil inventories dropped 2.333 million barrels at the end of last week, while distillates rose by 723,000 barrels and gasoline supplies increased by 1.322 million barrels.
Overnight, crude futures settled more than 2% lower on Tuesday, as investors weighed the impact of an OPEC-led deal to drain the glut in supply against the uptick in global output.
Oil prices slid 2%, adding to the 1% loss sustained in the previous session, as investors fretted about the sharp rise in U.S. production, despite expectations that U.S. crude stockpiles are set to fall for a fourth straight week.
Russian oil production fell to 11 million bpd last month, close to its output target under the deal with OPEC, Energy Ministry data showed on Tuesday. In November last year, OPEC and other producers, including Russia agreed to cut output by about 1.8 million barrels per day (bpd). The deal to cut supply came into effect in January this year for a period of six-months until June.
Meanwhile, Libya added to the glut in supply, after the country resumed output and production rose above 760,000 bpd to the highest rate since 2014, Mustafa Sanalla, chairman of the National Oil Corp. said on Monday.