Crude oil inventories increased unexpectedly last week and gasoline stockpiles dropped, the government said Wednesday. Crude supplies expanded by 2 million barrels, or 0.6 percent, to 365.1 million barrels, the Energy Department's Energy Information Administration said in its weekly report. Analysts expected a decline of 1.5 million barrels for the week ended June 18, according to a survey by Platts, the energy information arm of McGraw-Hill Cos. Gasoline inventories dropped by 800,000 barrels to 217.6 million barrels. Analysts expected gasoline levels to fall by 500,000 barrels. Demand for gasoline over the four weeks ended June 18 was 0.8 percent higher than a year earlier, averaging 9.2 million barrels a day. Refineries ran at 89.4 percent of total capacity on average, an increase of 1.7 percentage points from the subsequent week. Analysts expected capacity to increase 0.5 percentage point to 88.14 percent. Inventories of distillate fuel, which include diesel and heating oil, rose by 300,000 barrels to 156.9 million barrels for the week ended June 18. Analysts expected distillate stocks to grow by 1.4 million barrels. Oil prices fell $2.09 to $75.76 per barrel in morning trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

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