Oil futures off lows after API data show surprise draw in US crude stocks

Investing.com -- U.S. crude oil futures moved off lows in post-settlement trading Tuesday after the American Petroleum Institute reported a surprise decline in weekly domestic crude stocks.

Crude Oil WTI Futures, the U.S. benchmark, recently traded at $66.31 a barrel following the report after settling down 4.3% at $65.75 a barrel.

U.S. crude inventories decreased by about 2.8M barrels for the week ended Sept. 6, compared with a draw of 7.4M barrels reported by the API for the previous week. Economists were expecting a increase of about 0.7M barrels.

Gasoline stockpiles fell by about 513,000 barrels, while distillate inventories -- the class of fuels that includes diesel and heating oil -- rose by 191,000 barrels.

The official government inventory report is due Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. EST (1530 GMT).

"We are forecasting US crude inventories up 0.3 MM [barrels] for the week ending September 6," Macquarie said in a recent note.