Crude oil prices rose to a five-month high this week as signs of shrinking stockpiles in the US countered concern about Europe’s debt crisis dampening fuel demand.
 
US crude inventories declined for a second week, according to the Department of Energy, dropping 1.1 million barrels to 337 million barrels. Gasoline supplies rose 992,000 barrels, while distillate-fuel stockpiles (including diesel and heating oil) fell 2.1 million barrels to 133.7 million barrels. Adding upside pressure to crude oil prices was a statement from Enbridge and Enterprise Products Partners LP, the other owner of the 500 mile Seaway pipeline, which announced plans to reverse the north-flowing line that extends from Houston area refineries on the Gulf of Mexico to Cushing, Oklahoma.
 
The plan may reduce stockpiles from the storage depot by opening access to refiners on the Texas coast. This is the first attempt to reverse an existing pipeline to help drain Cushing’s inventories after supplies at Cushing increased for the fifth time in six weeks, rising to 32 million barrels in the period to 11 November. Brent crude oil for December delivery rose initially rose to $111.46 per barrel and US light sweet crude oil jumped to $103.37 a barrel, before falling this morning to $110.72 per barrel and $102.55 per barrel respectively, amid fresh concern over the European debt crisis. Market concern that the eurozone debt crisis has spread increased this morning after Spain’s borrowing costs surged to a new high, fuelling anxiety that demand will fall in the second largest oil consuming region (which currently uses 16% of total global oil demand).