Oil prices rose on Wednesday following unexpected drawdowns in U.S. crude and fuel stocks, outweighing downward pressure from the continued strength in the U.S. dollar.
Brent crude futures were up $2.33, or 2.7%, at $88.60 per barrel by 11:05 a.m. EST (1505 GMT). U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures rose $2.60, or 3.3%, to $81.10 a barrel.
U.S. crude stocks fell by 215,000 barrels in the most recent week, while gasoline inventories declined by 2.4 million barrels and distillate inventories by 2.9 million barrels, as refining activity declined following several outages. [EIA/S]
