U.S. crude oil inventories fell unexpectedly last week, chalking up their first decline in eight weeks, as imports dropped and demand from refiners edged up, government data on Thursday showed. Commercial crude oil inventories fell to 350.6 million barrels, a drop of 200,000 barrels for the week ended February 13, said the Energy Information Administration (EIA) report, delayed a day due to Monday's Presidents Day holiday. This decline countered analysts' average expectations that crude stocks in the United States added 3.0 million barrels. Crude oil imports fell by 859,000 barrels per day (bpd). Refinery runs or demand for crude oil feed by refiners was up by 16,000 bpd as refinery utilization logged a surprise rise of 0.7 percentage point to 82.3 percent of capacity instead of an expected drop of 0.3 percentage point, the EIA said. Meanwhile, stocks of distillates fuels, which include heating oil and diesel, fell 800,000 barrels to 140.8 million barrels, EIA said, lagging a forecast draw of 1.2 million barrels. Also running counter to expectations, gasoline supplies rose 1.1 million barrel to 218.7 million barrels, while analysts had eyed a decline of 500,000 barrels, the EIA report said. On Wednesday, the American Petroleum Institute said in its own weekly report that U.S. crude oil stockpiles rose 1.6 million barrels last week to 345.8 million barrels, despite an acceleration in refinery runs.

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