Fueling Strategy: Please double fill today/tonight, Friday AM wholesale prices will jump UP 6 cents – Be Safe Tonight!

NYMEX Crude $ 30.77 UP $.1100
NY Harbor ULSD $1.0792 DN $.0087
NYMEX Gasoline $ .9724 DN $.0310

NEWS
Oil futures posted a mixed finish Thursday, giving up big gains after an official from Saudi Arabia was quoted as saying the world’s swing producer was “not prepared” to cut oil production.

Those comments also came amid a rise in U.S. inventories of crude, gasoline and distillates. “If other producers want to limit or agree to a freeze in terms of additional production that may have an impact on the market but Saudi Arabia is not prepared to cut production,” Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Al Jubeir told Agence France-Presse in an interview Thursday. The Saudi official’s comments come after the world’s top oil producer reached a tentative agreement with Russia earlier this week to freeze production at current levels if other producers went along. Iran on Wednesday welcomed the pact but didn’t indicate it would comply.

Light, sweet crude futures for delivery in March finished with a gain of 11 cents, or 0.4%, at $30.77 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, after trading as high as $31.98 earlier in the day. April Brent crude on London’s ICE Futures exchange fell 22 cents, or 0.6%, to end at $34.28 a barrel.

Oil futures weakened after the Energy Information Administration said U.S. commercial crude inventories rose 2.1 million barrels in the week ended Feb. 12. That was smaller than the 3.3 million barrel build penciled in by economists surveyed by oil-data firm Platts. It came under additional pressure after the Saudi official’s comments were reported. On the inventory front, both gasoline and distillates showed unexpected rises, with gasoline stocks up 3 million barrels and distillate inventories up 1.4 million. The Platts survey found analysts looking for a 1-million-barrel fall in gasoline stocks and a 1.4 million-barrel drop in distillates. Oil futures climbed earlier as traders viewed Iran’s support for an agreement that other oil producers freeze their production a positive first step in stabilizing prices, even though Iran itself refused to comply.

Oil prices have been in the doldrums for nearly two years as supply growth persistently outpaced demand. Energy companies, particularly those with large upstream projects, are now responding by reducing investments and laying off workers. Deep-pocketed Saudi Arabia, which depends largely on oil revenue, ran a record deficit of nearly $98 billion last year, about 15% of gross domestic product.

Before the Saudi comments, analysts said tensions between Riyadh and Tehran had made it unlikely the OPEC members would cooperate.