ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø

August 17, 2005 3:00 PM, EDT

Click here to write a Letter to the Editor.

rude oil prices fell almost $3 a barrel, the biggest decline since April, following a Department of Energy report Wednesday showing that distillate fuel inventories, which include diesel, rose last week.

Crude oil for September delivery fell $2.83, or 4.3%, to close at $63.25 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange on Wednesday, Bloomberg reported.

DOE’s weekly inventory report showed that distillate inventories jumped 1.19 million barrels last week, to 131.1 million barrels.

Inventories of gasoline dropped 4.97 million barrels to 198.1 million barrels, the seventh straight decline. A drop of 1.5 million barrels was expected, Bloomberg reported.

13657