WORLD OIL PRICES (August 25-29, 2014 trading days)

World crude prices moderately recovered from previous week in view of several reports affecting the market, such as, the following:

• Simmering conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, with little sign that they will either escalate further or be resolved imminently. With no resolution to the said crises in sight, crude prices will likely move higher in the medium term;
• Market anticipation of a batch of US economic data that would give clues on whether the Federal Reserve will speed up its timetable for raising interest rates; 
• USDOE-EIA report of a 2.1 million barrel fall in overall US crude reserves, but with a 500,000 barrel
• increase at the key Cushing, Oklahoma depot.

However, market gains were capped by ongoing jitters over abundant crude supplies and weak demand amid poor global economic data.

In the Asian market, gasoline had marginal daily increases in the past week as the product's cracks continue to track global benchmarks, and additional prompt demand from Indonesia later in the week. Pertamina prematurely halted a week-old program to reduce the supply of subsidized fuel at its gas stations in the country ahead of planned partial maintenance at two of its refineries. Platts however noted that the market remained to have thin physical spot demand. Fresh regional demand is estimated to emerge at the start of the fourth quarter.

On the other hand, gasoil/diesel market had steady fundamentals, with lower supply from key exporting countries limiting cargoes available in Singapore. Earlier reports disclosed that refineries in North Asia reduced output due to poor refining margins. Platts however noted later in the week of strong exports from India, which has recently tendered, offering 60,000 mt of 500 ppm sulfur high-speed diesel for loading October 1-3 from New Mangalore. Relatedly, onshore stockpiles of middle distillates in Singapore also rose 57,000 barrels, or 0.5%, over August 21-27 to 11.056 million barrels. This was the second straight week of rising inventory.

Overall, Dubai crude increased week-on-week by about US$0.70/bbl. Both MOPS gasoline and diesel also increased by about a US$2.40 and US$0.80 per barrel, respectively.

FOREX:  Peso per US dollar rate appreciated week-on-week by P0.04 to P43.70, from P43.74 in the preceding 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 2 September, most of the oil companies implemented an increase of P0.65/L for gasoline, P0.25/L for diesel and P0.15/L for kerosene.

Conversely, household and auto LPG decreased by P0.70/kg and P0.39/L in view of the US$21/MT decrease in LPG Contract Price this month to US$773/MT, from US794/MT in August.

With the above price movements, year-to-date total adjustment for gasoline and diesel reduced to a net decrease of P2.18/liter and P3.15/liter, respectively. Household LPG now has a net decrease of P19.82/kg.

* RON 95

For more information, call the

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