U.S. oil demand continues its upward trajectory—reaching a record high last week–while product inventories have fallen to the lowest levels in three years. If the demand trend holds, oil prices have room to rise even more in the rest of the year, some analysts say. Despite the fact that Hurricane Ida’s impact on the petroleum sector distorted data in this week’s inventory report by the U.S. Energy Information Administration, product supplied—EIA’s proxy for demand—continued to pick up pace. Crude oil inventories declined by 1.5 million barrels for the week to September 3, with sizeable draws in fuel inventories as well, the EIA said in its weekly report. At 423.9 million barrels, crude oil inventories are below the five-year average for this time of the year. Gasoline inventories fell by 7.2 million barrels for the period, compared with a draw of 1.3 million bpd for the previous week. In middle […]