HOUSTON, Oct. 17 (Xinhua) -- The American Petroleum Institute (API) on Tuesday reported a decrease of 4.383 million barrels of crude oil in U.S. inventories for the week ending Oct. 13.
Analysts had expected a drop of 1.267 million barrels for the week.
The API reported a surge of 12.940 million barrels in the previous week.
Oil prices settled flat on Tuesday. The West Texas Intermediate for November delivery closed flat and settled at 86.66 U.S. dollars a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
