The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) revealed on Wednesday that crude inventories declined by 12.788 million barrels in the week ended June 21. Economists had forecast a decrease of 2.873 million barrels. It was the biggest drop in crude inventories since the week ended September 2, 2016. 

At the same time, gasoline stocks decreased by 0.996 million barrels, while analysts had expected they to be unchanged. Distillate stocks fell by 2.441 million barrels, while analysts had forecast an advance of 0.100 million barrels.

Meanwhile, oil production in the U.S. decreased by 100,000 barrels a day to 12.100 million barrels a day.

U.S. crude oil imports averaged 6.7 million barrels per day last week, down by 812,000 barrels per day from the previous week.