Global oil prices were down late Wednesday after official U.S. inventory figures posted an unexpected rise in the last seven days, but remain near their highest mark in about eight weeks.
Previously, oil prices for the U.S. and global benchmarks had edged quite higher as cautious optimism for a U.S.-China trade pact continued to support commodity prices and lift stock markets to record in recent days.
The West Texas Intermediate crude futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange for January delivery closed down 30 cents, or 0.5 percent, at $58.11 a barrel.
For the month to date, the contract is up more than 7 times, as January Brent crude - the international benchmark - fell 21 cents, or 0.3 percent, at $64.06 per barrel on the ICE Futures Europe. It has so far been trading around 6.4 percent in November.
The U.S. markets are closed for the Thanksgiving holiday on Thursday and will reopen on Friday. As refineries trim down their crude output, U.S. crude supply was up last week, while inventories of gasoline and distillates were up as well, said the Energy Information Administration.
In the week ended November 22, Crude inventories rose by 1.6 million barrels. Based on data from the EIA, refinery crude deliveries fell by 101,000 barrels per day. Inventories of gasoline increased by 5.1 million barrels.
The American Petroleum Institute announced late Tuesday that for November 22, according to estimates, U.S. oil stocks increased by around 3.6 million barrels.
This finding defied the predictions of observers and may have primed the sector for an increase in the next coming days. Also, the API data showed a stockpile increase for gasoline of 4.3 million barrels, along with a supply decline of 665,000 barrels for distillates.
The market showed little response to Baker Hughes' early release of data on weekly rig counts. The U.S. count was down from last week to 802, with three unchanged miscellaneous rigs.
The number of U.S. rigs was significantly down 274 from the count of 1,076 last year, with oil rigs falling to 219, gas rigs down to 58, and miscellaneous rigs falling to 33. Before Wednesday's stock and rig results, oil prices had been at their most stable levels.
Meanwhile, this week's positive tone gained another momentum when the US President Donald Trump said their relations with China were in the "final throes," while China's Commerce Ministry said Vice Premier Liu He spoke with the US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to strike a "phase two" deal.
