Falling gasoline prices are expected to continue in the weeks leading into the holiday season.
Bladen Journal file
ELIZABETHTOWN — Average gas prices around Elizabethtown saw a significant price drop in the last week, falling from $3.40 per gallon a week ago to $3.23 on Monday.
Drivers found gas prices around the rest of Bladen County about the same or even a few cents lower per gallon.
National price watchers on Friday suggested the falling prices were part of a trend expected to continue – at least in the short term.
For the third straight week, the nation’s average price of gasoline has declined, falling 10.2 cents from a week ago to $3.67 per gallon yesterday according to GasBuddy data compiled from more than 11 million individual price reports covering over 150,000 gas stations across the country.
The national average is down 13.8 cents from a month ago and 25.0 cents per gallon lower than a year ago. The national average price of diesel has fallen 4.0 cents in the last week and stands at $4.48 per gallon, 52.5 cents lower than one year ago.
“At long last, the decline in gas prices that we’ve been waiting to see has arrived, and the locomotive of falling prices has only recently started on a downhill, gaining momentum. However, some new caution signs have emerged with the recent attacks on Israel, potentially destabilizing a sensitive region. I’m hopeful the violence won’t spread, limiting the impact of these falling gas prices. Even with oil prices rising as a reaction to the attacks, I remain optimistic the national average could decline another 25-45 cents by late November, with prices potentially falling nearly triple that in California,” said Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy. “Even the price of diesel has seen downward pressure with oil prices plummeting last week on fears that the Fed will be forced to continue raising rates, eating into demand growth, leading a barrel of crude to drop into the mid-$80s, but we remain concerned about a potentially destabilized Middle East and the potential impact to oil prices should the region see violence escalate.”
OIL PRICES
After bouncing around near and above $90 for the last few weeks, oil has not been able to maintain its upward trend as renewed fears about further interest rate hikes pour cold water on demand prospects in the months ahead. Meanwhile, OPEC+ plans to hold the line on its current production levels at a key meeting this week, according to sources. The price of oil has recently maintained the $90 per barrel mark on Saudi Arabia and Russia’s extensive production cuts, seen as eating into global oil inventories, which could pose problems in 2024, should the Fed start to ease its tight monetary policy. In early Monday trade, a barrel of West Texas Intermediate crude oil was up 32 cents per barrel to $91.11, up from last week’s $89.71 per barrel start. Brent crude oil was also in the black, trading 52 cents higher to $92.72 per barrel, up from last week’s $93.06 per barrel open.
OIL AND REFINED PRODUCTS
Last week’s report from the Energy Information Administration showed U.S. crude oil inventories fell another 2.2 million barrels, which stand 14 million above a year ago, while also being 4% below the five year average for this time of year. Inventories in Cushing, Oklahoma, the NYMEX delivery point, fell to 22 million barrels, while the SPR also saw a surprising drop of 300,000 barrels. Gasoline inventories rose a modest 1 million barrels, and now stand 8.3 million, or nearly 4% higher than a year ago. Distillate inventories inched up 400,000 barrels and are 5.0% higher than a year ago, but with extensive refinery maintenance in PADD 1, a key region, inventories are very tight, which could still lead to a break out in diesel and heating oil prices in the weeks ahead. Implied gasoline demand, a proxy for retail demand, rose 210,000bpd to 8.62 million, while refinery utilization dipped 2.4 percentage points as refinery maintenance season ramps up, to stand at 89.5%.