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By Michael Poulson, A/S Global Risk Management

Oil prices inch up on inventories, weaker dollar. The weekly oil inventory report from the EIA confirmed Tuesday's API oil stocks data trend with draws all over, see details below. It is the first time since the beginning of January that we see draws in crude oil stocks.

Release: EIA oil data (Consensus)
Crude: -0.237M barrels (3.713M)
Distillates: -4.229M barrels (-1.663M)
Gasoline: -3.055M barrels (-1.950M)
Refinery utilization: -0.8%

The U.S. central bank, Fed, - as expected - raised interest rates last night. Comments following the decision indicated three hikes this year as it noted that business investment has "firmed somewhat" and risks are "roughly balanced". Some market participants had expected a more hawkish tone from the U.S. central bank with announcement of more hikes this year and the dollar weakened somewhat after the announcement which supported oil prices. This morning, the Bank of Japan kept interest rates unchanged (-0.10%), later today the Bank of England will also release its interest rate decision followed by meeting minutes.

In its monthly report, the International Energy Agency (IEA) foresees an oil supply/demand deficit of 500,000 bpd in the first half of 2017 if OPEC complies with the production cut deal -see table below.

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A/S Global Risk Management is a provider of customised hedging solutions for the management of price risk on fuel expenses. The company has offices in Denmark and Singapore. For further details about its risk management products and services, please call +45 88 38 00 00 or email hedging@global-riskmanagement.com.