Aug.14. In global petroleum market news, oil prices spiked back to near USD 117 a barrel on Wednesday after the weekly inventory report showed a steeper-than-expected drawdown in U.S. gasoline supplies. Light, sweet crude for September delivery rose 75 cents to USD 116.75 a barrel in electronic trading on NYMEX by midday in Singapore. The contract jumped USD 2.99 overnight to settle at USD 116.00 a barrel. In London, Brent crude for September delivery rose 84 cents to USD 114.31 a barrel. Before the stockpile report, September NYMEX crude touched a low of USD 112.87 on Wednesday, more than $34 below its July 11 high of USD 147.27. Later, in its weekly inventory report, the U.S. Energy Department's Energy Information Administration said gasoline supplies fell by 6.4 mn barrels for the week ended August 8, nearly three times more than the 2.2 mn barrel drop that the consensus figure was calling for. The EIA also reported that crude stockpiles fell 400,000 barrels last week against analyst expectations of a 500,000 barrel build. Inventories of distillate fuel, which include diesel and heating oil, decreased by 1.7 mn barrels, which the consensus forecast had expected distillate stocks to rise by 1.9 mn barrels. Mixing the picture, though, the EIA also said demand for gasoline over the four weeks ended August 8 was almost 2% lower than a year earlier, averaging 9.4 mn bpd. Moving forward, this is the first bright news the oil market has seen in quite a while. We believe the dramatic drop-off in commodities, and specifically oil, has been well overdone. We still expect crude oil to reach USD 150, but this evenT may not happen until around the end of 2008, when demand soars on seasonality. We also maintain that investors have overestimated the impact a slowdown in the U.S. economy will have on global demand for crude. The vast majority still believe that the U.S. is the epicenter of the world economy. While there can be no question that the U.S. is still a very important player as far as commodity demand is concerned, we would argue that the epicenter has already shifted away from the U.S. market. China is the biggest consumer, and increasingly India. That said, the downturn in the U.S. has been the main factor behind lower oil prices, along with a stronger dollar.