Wednesday, November 09, 2005

Inventories Adding to US Growth, Oil Supplies Rise Substantially

- Wholesale Inventories for September rose .6% versus estimates of a .3% increase and a .5% gain in August.
- Gasoline supplies rose 4.22M barrels vs. estimates of a 1.2M barrel increase. Distillate inventories fell 84,000 barrels vs. estimates of a 750,000 barrel rise. Refinery Utilization rose 1.51% vs. estimates of a 2.43% increase.
BOTTOM LINE: Sales at US wholesalers in September rose by the most in more than a year, exceeding a gain in inventories and suggesting companies may need to step up production to meet rising demand, Bloomberg reported. Sales surged 2.4% in September, which was the largest rise since March 2004. Moreover, the inventory-to-sales ratio fell to 1.15 in September, the lowest since May 2004. I expect inventory rebuilding to continue adding to economic growth at least through year-end.

Traders are paying more attention to the decline in distillate inventories than the substantial crude build. I expect the next down-leg in oil prices to begin as it gets colder over the next few weeks.

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