API's and MasterCard- Double Whammy

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- The American Petroleum Institute on Tuesday showed a higher-than-anticipated increase in crude-oil supplies for the week ended Oct. 22. The trade group said the nation's stockpiles of oil rose 6.4 million barrels, against expectations of an increase of 1.5 million barrels, according to analysts surveyed by Platts. Gasoline stocks declined 1.8 million barrels, whereas the analysts had expected an increase of 900,000 barrels. Supplies of distillates, which include heating oil and diesel, rose 818,000 barrels; they were forecast to decline 1.5 million barrels. The API report comes a day before the more closely watched data from the Department of Energy.

 And

The following MasterCard report describes an acceleration of demand destruction. Please note that demand year to date is now negative vs. 2 weeks ago.


NEW YORK, Oct 26 (Reuters) - U.S. retail gasoline demand

fell 1.7 percent last week with the New England, Central
Atlantic and West Coast regions posting larger drops,
MasterCard Advisors' SpendingPulse report showed on Tuesday.

U.S. average gasoline demand fell 161,000 barrels per day
(bpd) to 9.097 million bpd in the week to Oct. 22.

Year-on-year, weekly demand declined 2.7 percent.

Over the latest four weeks, gasoline consumption in the
United States, the world's top oil consumer, fell 1.3 percent
from a year earlier.

Average retail prices for gasoline held steady last week at
$2.82 a gallon, MasterCard said, though that was up 8.5 percent
from year-earlier levels.

MasterCard Advisors estimates retail gasoline demand based
on aggregate sales activity in the MasterCard payments system
coupled with estimates for all other payment forms including
cash and checks.