Investing.com - Crude oil prices held weaker in Asia on Wednesday as industry data showed a larger than expected build in U.S. stockpiles, adding more bearish sentiment on the supply outlook.
Crude oil for December delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange dropped 0.75% to $46.32 a barrel. Brent oil for January delivery on the ICE Futures Exchange in London eased 0.60% to $47.85 a barrel.
The American Petroleum Institute said on Tuesday that crude oil inventories last week surged 9.3 million barrels for the second straight weekly build under its estimates and well above market expectations.
Gasoline inventories dropped 3.6 million barrels last week, while distillate fell 3.1 million barrels, a fourth straight drop. Cushing recorded a build of 1.0 million barrels for the week.
Official data from the Energy Information Administration will be released Wednesday, amid forecasts for an oil-stock increase of 1.0 million barrels.
Overnight, oil prices pushed higher during North American hours on Tuesday, bouncing back after plunging 4% to one-month lows in the prior session as market players looked ahead to weekly data from the U.S. on stockpiles of crude and refined products.
OPEC reached an agreement to cap output to a range of 32.5 million to 33.0 million barrels per day in talks held in Algeria in late September. However, the 14-member oil group said it won’t finalize details on individual output quotas until its next official meeting in Vienna on November 30.
The possibility that producers could walk away empty-handed from the November meeting looms large after Iraq, Iran, Nigeria and Libya all signaled they might not take part in the proposed production cut deal. Russia’s unclear stance is also fueling uncertainty.