Despite the usa crude oil product inventory rising to a 14-week high, brent crude oil futures slightly increased in asia's early trading.

As of 12:00 peking time, the main January contract for Brent crude oil was quoted at $73.97 per barrel, up 16 cents/barrel from the November 20 closing price, which had fallen 50 cents/barrel at the time.

The main January contract for crude oil was quoted at $68.91 per barrel, up 16 cents/barrel from the November 20 closing price, which had dropped 49 cents/barrel at the time.

The EIA report shows that US crude oil inventories increased by 545,000 barrels last week, reaching a 14-week high, mainly due to increased inventories on the west coast and in the midwestern region.

As of the week ending on November 15, US crude oil inventories reached 0.4303 billion barrels, an increase from the previous week's 0.4297 billion barrels, the highest level since August 9. However, compared to the same period last year, inventories decreased by 17.8 million barrels.

Meanwhile, Iraq is cracking down on the illegal smuggling of crude oil, asphalt, and other petroleum products to Iran. News on November 12 indicated that the Iraqi Foreign Ministry requested Iranian authorities to stop the truck transportation of oil, black oil, and other petroleum products into Iran through the semi-autonomous Kurdish region of Iraq border crossings, unless these exports are licensed by the state-owned Somo company.

This directive will affect Kurdish oil producers in Iraq, who have been relying on local sales since closing a key export pipeline to Turkey last year. After the closure, foreign operators have stated that they have been shipping crude oil to local refineries, but according to Argus, Kurdish crude oil is also being smuggled by truck to Turkey, Iran, and Syria.

Saudi Aramco, the state-owned company of Saudi Arabia, has notified Norwegian drilling contractor Borr Drilling to suspend the operation of its jack-up drilling rig Arab II, the latest in a series of drilling suspensions since the Saudi government decided to halt crude oil production capacity expansion.

Since the Saudi Ministry of Energy requested Saudi Aramco in January to halt the progress of plans to increase the maximum sustainable crude oil production capacity from 1 million barrels per day to 13 million barrels per day, Saudi Arabia's demand for drilling has decreased. Neither the government nor Saudi Aramco has explained why the capacity expansion plans have been put on hold.

(The above content is from Argus, an independent international energy and commodity price assessment agency)