Crude oil prices lost their gains to open Wednesday on a lower note as an increase in the U.S.' crude oil stocks offset optimism that OPEC could make deeper cuts to rid some of the oversupply in the market.
International benchmark Brent crude was trading at $59.49 per barrel at 0925 GMT for a 0.16% loss after it ended Tuesday at $59.58 a barrel.
American benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) was at $54.14 a barrel at the same time for a 0.13% decline after closing the previous session at $54.21 per barrel.
Brent crude rose 1.05% and WTI soared 1.69% on Tuesday based on reported expectations that OPEC and its allies at their upcoming meeting in December would agreed to make deeper cuts to their oil production.
Dubbed as OPEC+, the group agreed to lower total production by 1.2 million barrels per day in December 2018 but so far have failed to support prices due to the glut of supply in the global oil market.
American Petroleum Institute (API) said Tuesday that it estimates U.S. crude oil inventories increased by 4.45 million barrels for the week ending Oct. 17.
For the previous week before, API estimated a build of 10.45 million barrels in crude oil stocks.
By Ovunc Kutlu
Anadolu Agency
energy@aa.com.tr