The American Petroleum Institute (API) estimated that crude oil inventories in the United States fell by 399,000 barrels in the week ending July 3. In the week prior, US crude oil inventories fell by 6.072 million barrels. Although commercial crude oil inventories excluding the SPR have been falling rapidly for more than two months, shedding almost 60 million barrels over the last twelve weeks, US crude inventories are only down 8.6 million barrels so far this year, according to API data, kept in check by draws from the SPR.