Sam Fletcher
Senior Writer

HOUSTON, May 15 -- Prices for crude and products fell May 14 following a government report of a larger-than-expected build in US distillate fuel inventories and a larger-than-expected fall in gasoline stocks.

"On a day when polar bears became a protected species, the very rare and elusive oil bear came out of hiding, driving crude prices down on the trading session," said analysts in the Houston office of Raymond James & Associates Inc. "However, with worldwide economic growth continuing to surprise on the upside, most recently with Germany announcing that it had first quarter economic growth of 1.8%—double what economists were expecting—look for the oil bears' population to remain threatened and endangered."

Natural gas prices climbed, hitting an intraday record of $11.794/MMbtu on the New York market, after Enterprise Products Partners LP said repair of its Independence Trail pipeline will not be completed before mid-June. Analysts at Pritchard Capital Partners LLC, New Orleans, said, "Traders had been anticipating a mid-May restart to as much as 900 MMcfd. When the hub went off-line on Apr. 8 due to a leak on the associated Independence Trail pipeline, the original repair estimate was 1-4 weeks. While the hub's extended outage adds to the concern of some that natural gas storage will have a hard time refilling in time for the winter heating season, other market experts are not too concerned."