US oil futures rise after API reports much larger drop in US crude stocks

U.S. crude oil futures inched higher in post-settlement trading Tuesday after the American Petroleum Institute reported a larger-than-expected decline in weekly domestic crude stockpiles.

Crude Oil WTI Futures, the U.S. benchmark, recently traded at $74.42 a barrel following the report after settling up 0.9% at $74.25 a barrel.

U.S. crude inventories fell by about 4 million barrels for the week ended Jan. 3, compared with a draw of 1.4M barrels reported by the API for the previous week. Economists were expecting a draw of just 250,000 barrels.

Gasoline stockpiles increased by about 7.3M barrels, while distillate inventories -- the class of fuels that includes diesel and heating oil -- climbed by 3.2M barrels.

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