Crude inventories rose last week, while gasoline supplies dropped, the government said Wednesday.

Crude inventories rose by 7.3 million barrels, or 2.1 percent, to 351.3 million barrels, which is 2.8 percent below year-ago levels, the Energy Department's Energy Information Administration said in its weekly report.

Analysts expected a build of 1.67 million barrels for the week ended March 19, according to a survey by Platts, the energy information arm of McGraw-Hill Cos.

Gasoline inventories fell 2.7 million barrels, or 1.2 percent, to 224.6 million barrels. That drop was steeper than what analysts expected. Supplies are 3.9 percent above year-ago levels.

Demand for gasoline over the four weeks ended March 19 was 1.2 percent higher than a year earlier, averaging nearly 9 million barrels a day.

At the same time, U.S. refineries ran at 81.1 percent of total capacity on average, a rise of half a percentage point from the prior week. Analysts expected capacity to slip to 80.48 percent.

Inventories of distillate fuel, which include diesel and heating oil, fell by 2.4 million barrels to 145.7 million barrels for the week ended March 19. Analysts expected distillate stocks to drop by 1.25 million barrels.

Crude prices fell $1.24 to $80.67 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.