New York, April 7

Oil prices surged on Wednesday as US crude stockpiles contracted surprisingly.

The West Texas Intermediate for May delivery moved up $1.86 to settle at $37.75 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, while Brent crude for June delivery increased $1.97 to close at $39.84 a barrel on the London ICE Futures Exchange, Xinhua news agency reported.

US crude supplies of last week dropped 4.9 million barrels to 529.9 million barrels, 47.5 million barrels more than one year before, said the Energy Information Administration (EIA) in its weekly report released Wednesday.

Crude production of the country lost 14,000 to 9.008 million barrels a day last week, according to EIA.

Countries from OPEC and non-OPEC will meet on April 17 in Doha to discuss the output freeze.

Nawal al-Fezaia, OPEC governor of Kuwait, said on Tuesday that major oil producers can reach an agreement over a production freeze even if Iran does not join the action.