Fuel Prices: No significant change during Christmas – IES

The Institute of Energy Security (IES) has predicted that there will be no significant changes in the prices of fuel at the pumps during the Christmas period.

A statement signed by IES Principal Research Analyst Richmond Rockson on Thursday, December 14, said the reasons is “due to the fairly stable price of both Crude oil and refined products on the global oil market, coupled with the marginal dip of the Cedi’s value against the U.S. Dollar”.

However IES said it expects a “fall slightly due to the reduction of the Price Stabilization and Recovery Levy, and should Oil Marketing Companies seek to reward fuel consumers during the yuletide”.

According to IES, “the hopes of consumers were dashed, as the intervention by government and the National Petroleum Authority (NPA) by reducing the Price Stabilization and Recovery Levy on the local fuel Price Build-up yielded no result at the pump, with consumers paying same amount for a litre of fuel at the pump within the two-week period”.

“Although price per litre remains relatively high compared to a year ago, the current prices have been same for three consecutive Pricing-windows with average Gasoline price per litre going for Ghs4.46, while Gasoil is sold at Ghs4.45 per litre on national average terms,” the release added.

IES-Marketscan shows Zen Petroleum continues to sell the cheapest Gasoline and Gasoil on the local market at Ghs4.391 and Ghs4.371 per litre respectively, followed by Cash Oil and Lucky Oil.

IEs indicated that oil producing countries continue to rake in more revenue as Brent crude oil is sold at an average of $63.83 per barrel, from a previous average price of $62.94 per barrel representing a change of 1.41 percent.

During the past two weeks, Brent crude spot price surged above $65 per barrel for the first time since June 2015 as a result of the shutdown of the Forties North Sea pipeline. Figures from Standard and Poor’s Global Platts benchmark for oil commodities suggests Gasoline prices decreased marginally from $604.65 per metric tonne to $600.86 per metric tonne (-0.63%), while Gasoil rose slightly from $560.73 per metric tonne to close at $560.86 per metric tonne (0.02%) within the period.

IES Economic Desk’s monitoring of the Foreign Exchange market found that the local currency lost some value against the US Dollar, trading at an average rate of Ghs4.51 from a previous average value of Ghs4.48 for the period under review.

As at the morning of December 12, 2017; total Gasoline and Gasoil imported within the period under review was 172,153 metric tonnes, with Gasoil import being 134,603 metric tonnes, whilst 37,550 metric tonnes of Gasoline was discharged into terminals.