Yen dives as BOJ plays down chance of hikes, soothing markets

Commercial crude oil inventories in the United States, not considering those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), in the week ending on August 2 were down 3.7 million barrels, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) stated in its report published on Wednesday. At the same time, crude refinery inputs stood at an average of 16.4 million barrels per day (bpd) during the same week, representing a 252,000 bpd increase compared to last week's average. Refineries operated at 90.5% of their operable capacity last week. Gasoline production increased last week, averaging 10.0 million barrels per day. Crude oil imports average was 6.2 million bpd, a 729,000 decrease compared to the same period of last week. post: EIA: US WEEKLY CRUDE PRODUCTION HITS RECORD 13.4 MLN B/D.WTI Extends Bounce Off 6-Mo Lows After Sixth Straight Weekly Crude Draw Oil prices have rebounded strongly overnight on the heels of the BoJ's big dovish 'fold', which trumped the across-the-board inventory builds reported by API. Additionally, traders are also closely monitoring geopolitical risks. In the Middle East, nations are bracing for a potential Iranian attack on Israel as payback for assassinations of Hezbollah and Hamas leaders. Ukrainian troops also launched a rare cross-border attack into Russia. API • Crude +0.18mm • Cushing +1.07mm • Gasoline +3.31mm • Distillates +1.22mm DOE • Crude -3.728mm (-800k exp) • Cushing +579k • Gasoline +1.34mm • Distillates +949k Contrary to API's reported build, the official DOE data shows Crude stocks falling for the sixth straight week (the longest streak of inventory draws since January 2022)...