us crudeoil inventories declined by more than expected last week while gasoline and diesel stockpiles also fell according to data released wednesday by the energy information administration benchmark us oil prices that were near flat before the mostly bullish report was released turned higher afterward the nymex frontmonth crude contract for february delivery was recently up 1 at 7674 a barrel crudeoil stockpiles declined by 36 million barrels to 420 million barrels and are now about 7 below the fiveyear average the eia said analysts surveyed by the wall street journal had predicted crude stockpiles would fall by 32 million barrels from the prior week oil stored at cushing the delivery point for us stocks rose by 11 million barrels from the previous week to 347 million barrels the eia said in its weekly report us crudeoil production rose by 200000 barrels a day from the previous week to a fresh 19monthhigh of 118 million barrels a day according to the eia gasoline stockpiles fell by 15 million barrels to 2227 million barrels compared with analysts expectations for inventories to increase by 200000 barrels from the previous week distillate stocks which include heating oil and diesel fuel fell by 17 million barrels to 1224 million barrels and are now about 14 below the fiveyear average the eia said analysts were forecasting distillates inventories would rise by 200000 barrels from the previous week the refining capacity utilization rate rose by 01 percentage points from the previous week to 897 compared with analysts forecasts for a 02 percentage point decrease us oil inventories for the week ended dec 24 note numbers in millions of barrels with the exception of refinery use which is in percentage points