American Petroleum Institute data showed crude inventories fell 1.6 million barrels for the week ended Aug. 20, while gasoline stockpiles fell 1 million barrels, according to sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Analysts were expecting crude stockpiles to fall by 2.7 million barrel and gasoline stocks to drop by 1.6 million barrels, according to a Reuters poll. Last week's losses were driven by fears that the spread of the highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus in Asia would slow the region's economic recovery. "Oil has benefited from easing delta variant concerns with the world's two largest economies, the U.S. and China, but that is not necessarily the case in Sydney and Japan," said Moya. ANZ commodity analysts pointed to a pick-up in traffic in Beijing and Shanghai as evidence of the Delta variant being "stamped out".
