HOUSTON, Dec. 28 (Xinhua) -- U.S. crude oil inventories continued to fall after a month of stead decrease, the U.S. Department of Energy said Thursday.

According to the Weekly Petroleum Status Report by the U.S. Energy Information Administration, U.S. commercial crude oil inventories (excluding those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve) decreased by 4.6 million barrels from the previous week.

At 431.9 million barrels, U.S. crude oil inventories are in the middle of the average range for this time of year.

Total products supplied over the last four-week period averaged 20.6 million barrels per day, up by 3.5 percent from the same period last year. Over the last four weeks, motor gasoline product supplied averaged over 9.2 million barrels per day, up by 2.0 percent from the same period last year. Distillate fuel product supplied averaged 4.1 million barrels per day over the last four weeks, up by 0.7 percent from the same period last year. Jet fuel product supplied is up 12.4 percent compared to the same four-week period last year.

The national average retail regular gasoline price increased to 2.472 U.S. dollars per gallon on Dec. 25, 0.022 dollar above last week' s price and 0.163 dollar more than a year ago. The national average retail diesel fuel price increased to 2.903 dollars per gallon, 0.002 dollar per gallon over last week and 0.363 dollar above a year ago.

The West Texas Intermediate (WTI) price was 58.25 U.S. dollars per barrel on Dec. 22, or 0.96 dollar above previous week's price and 6.24 dollar over a year ago.

This week, the price of WTI crude oil has inched closer to 60 dollars a barrel -- the highest prices have been since 2015. Oil was trading at near 60 dollars a barrel after the inventory figures were released.