Gasoline in the EU, in prewar prices

The price of regular gasoline in the United States reached a level during the week of Thanksgiving that was lower than it was before the start of the war between Russia and Ukraine.

From November 22 to 28, regular gasoline had an average price of $3,389 per gallon, its lowest level since the week ended February 14 ($3,372 per gallon), according to data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA, for its acronym in English) of the United States.

The war between Russia and Ukraine, which began on February 24, caused a rise in international oil prices that in turn triggered gasoline prices in the American Union.

In early June, a gallon of gasoline peaked at $4.844, from which it is down 30%, or $1.45.

Fuel had a drop of 3.12% last week, its biggest weekly drop since August of this year.

Patrick De Haan, head of Oil Analysis at GasBuddy (a firm that collects fuel prices throughout the United States), commented that “all the metrics look very positive for motorists” and anticipated that this week they will probably continue to fall. prices.

“It is very possible that the national average price of gasoline will drop below $3 a gallon by Christmas week, which would be a great gift for motorists after a heady year at the pumps,” De Haan said.

With this fall, the price of gasoline spun three weeks down. Oil also has three consecutive weeks of declines.

In these three weeks, crude accumulates a drop of more than 15%, while gasoline barely 6.58 percent.

US West Texas Intermediate oil went from 92.61 to 78.20 dollars per barrel in that period, while the Mexican export mix went from 85.78 to 70.84 dollars per barrel. Both reached 120 dollars per barrel in March and June.

Ana Azuara, a Raw Materials analyst at Banco Base, explained that crude oil prices have been pressured by the expectation that demand will fall due to the closures due to Covid-19 in China. The Asian nation is the main importer of oil.

In Texas, cheaper

In Texas, fuel prices continued to decline, trading below $3 a gallon for the second week in a row.

Between November 22 and 28, regular gasoline traded at $2,810 per gallon, down 3.83% from last week’s level ($2,922 per gallon). With this, the border state continues to be the entity with the lowest gasoline prices in the entire United States, according to EIA data.

In contrast, the state where gasoline is most expensive is California, where a gallon had an average price of $4,813 last week.

sebastian.diaz@eleconomista.mx