US oil futures slightly higher despite larger-than-expected build in crude stocks
Investing.com -- U.S. crude oil futures was slightly higher in post-settlement trading Tuesday even after the American Petroleum Institute reported a larger-than-expected increase in weekly domestic crude stockpiles.
Crude Oil WTI Futures , the U.S. benchmark, recently traded at $72.76 a barrel following the report after settling up 0.6% at $72.70 a barrel.
U.S. crude inventories increased by about 5 million barrels for the week ended Jan. 31, compared with a build of 2.9M barrels reported by the API for the previous week. Economists were expecting a build of about 3.2M barrels.
Gasoline stockpiles increased by about 5.4M barrels, while distillate inventories -- the class of fuels that includes diesel and heating oil -- fell by about 7.0M barrels.
The official government inventory report is due Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. ET (1530 GMT).