The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) revealed that crude inventories surged by 5.479 million barrels in the week ended April 19. Economists had forecast an increase of 1.000 million barrels.

At the same time, gasoline stocks fell by 2.129 million barrels, while analysts had expected a drop of 1.822 million barrels. Distillate stocks declined by 0.662 million barrels, while analysts had forecast a decrease of 0.900 million barrels.

Meanwhile, oil production in the U.S. increased by 100,000 barrels a day to 12.200 million barrels a day.

U.S. crude oil imports averaged 7.1 million barrels per day last week, up by 1,157,000 barrels per day from the previous week.