President Donald Trump said Monday the U.S. would take advantage of the historic drop in oil prices to buy 75 million barrels to replenish the national strategic stockpile after U.S. crude oil futures collapsed below 0 U.S. dollars on Monday for the first time in history.

"We are filling up our national petroleum reserves ... You know, the strategic reserves. And we are looking to put as much as 75 million barrels into the reserves themselves," Trump told reporters at his daily coronavirus press conference.

Later in the briefing, he specified that he would only buy that amount if Congress authorized the funding – or if the federal government could rent storage space to third parties for a fee.

U.S. oil prices rebounded above zero Tuesday, a day after futures ended in negative territory for the first time as a coronavirus-triggered collapse in demand leaves the world awash in crude. U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate for May delivery was changing hands at 1.10 U.S. dollars a barrel after closing at minus 37.63 U.S. dollars in New York, the worst plunge in history amid a coronavirus-induced supply glut.

The Department of Energy is in the process of leasing some of the roughly 77 million barrels of available space in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) to U.S. oil companies to help them deal with the dearth of commercial storage as the coronavirus outbreak crushes domestic energy demand.

The president had announced his intention on March 13 to fill the SPR to the brim. As of April 17, it contained 635 million barrels of its current authorized limit of 713.5 million barrels.

Stored in a complex of four underground sites along the Gulf coasts of Texas and Louisiana, in the south of the United States, the SPR has a total storage capacity of 727 million barrels. This is intended for use in case of emergencies such as the 1991 Iraq War, or in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina.

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U.S. oil prices crash below $0 a barrel, worst plunge since 1983

Meanwhile, Trump also said the administration would consider stopping oil shipments from Saudi Arabia to lift the market.

The U.S. president described a historic drop in oil prices as short-term and stemming from a "financial squeeze."

(With input from Reuters, AFP)

(Cover: A 3D-printed oil pump jack is seen in front of a displayed stock graph and "$0 Barrel" words, April 20, 2020. /Reuters)