The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released its crude oil inventories data on Wednesday. U.S. crude inventories declined by 3.4 million barrels to 540.0 million in the week to May 06.

Analysts had expected U.S. crude oil inventories to rise by 0.5 million barrels.

Gasoline inventories decreased by 1.23 million barrels, according to the EIA.

Crude stocks at the Cushing, Oklahoma, climbed by 1.52 million barrels.

U.S. crude oil imports fell by 5,000 barrels per day.

Refineries in the U.S. were running at 89.1% of capacity, down from 89.7% the previous week.

Oil production fell by 0.3% last week to 8.802 million barrels a day from 8.825 million barrels a day in the previous week.