WORLD OIL PRICES (For January 7-11, 2013 trading days)

The report of the US-DOE on increased oil inventory initially pulled prices lower by about a dollar early on the trading week. US crude was said to have grown a bit lower than expected but gasoline and distillate fuel stocks soared, well beyond analyst’s expectation. Ample oil supplies and weak demand in the US, the world’s biggest oil consumer, was leading to softer prices.

However, improved manufacturing activity in China partly triggered an over a dollar increase in oil prices by midweek. Manufacturing activity in the country reportedly expanded in December for a third straight month, adding to signs that said economy is emerging from a prolonged slowdown.

On the supply side, the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) latest oil market report disclosed that supply from outside OPEC will rise ahead of the global demand growth has also supported last week’s price drop.

On Platts assessment, regional market for gasoil were steady to marginally higher, with relatively stronger spot demand from traders in Europe, cargoes for Middle East and in Asia particularly Sri Lanka and Vietnam.

Meanwhile, Asian gasoline slipped down on expectations of another round of arbitrage supply coming from the US West Coast amid muted spot demand in the region. Weakness in the US market was due to a massive build in stocks, resulting to a fast narrowing East-West spread led to Asia being an arbitrage destination for surplus barrels from the US. Traders at the same time were also looking at diverting their Indian barrels away from Asia. The overall supply from regional refineries was tentatively seen steady with little incremental demand from key Southeast Asian importers, e.g. Indonesia and Vietnam.

The latest development in the gasoline market overshadowed early reports of massive gasoline requirement by Saudi Aramco Trading, Inc. that brought the price of gasoline higher in previous weeks.

Week-on-week, Dubai crude had marginal decline keeping average last week similar to previous week. MOPS gasoline decreased by more than a dollar, contrary to that of diesel, which increased by about a dollar.

FOREX: The week-on-week peso per US dollar appreciated by P0.11 to P40.89, from P40.78 in previous week.

Other recommended reference sites:

(1) http://www.aip.com.au/pricing (2) http://www.med.govt.nz/ers/oil_pet/prices/prices.html

DOMESTIC OIL PRICES

Effective 15 January 2012, most the oil companies implemented a decrease of P0.40/liter for gasoline and P0.15/liter for regular gasoline. On the contrary, diesel was increased by P0.25/liter.

The recent adjustments resulted to a net increase of P0.10/l for diesel and net decrease of P0.25/l for gasoline this year.

For more information, call the

Department of Energy:
Pricing: 840-2187
LPG: 840-2130
Fuels: 840-5669
SMS: (0915) 4469421
Email: oilmonitor@doe.gov.ph
Website: http://www.doe.gov.ph