Petroleum companies adjust fuel pump prices

Jul 23, 2023

OIL firms will raise fuel prices this week as global oil prices continue to surge due to tightening OPEC supply.

In separate advisories, oil companies said Monday that gasoline prices will go up by P0.30 per liter, diesel by P0.70 per liter, and kerosene by P0.80 per liter.

This was announced by Petron, Shell, Caltex, Total, Seaoil, UniOil, Phoenix, PTT, and Cleanfuel. The price hikes takes effect starting today, Tuesday.

This week’s price adjustment extends price hikes for diesel and kerosene to eight consecutive weeks and seventh for gasoline.

Last August 22, oil companies implemented an increase of P1.10/liter for gasoline, P0.20/liter for diesel and P0.70/liter for kerosene. These price adjustments resulted in a year-to-date net increase of P14.50/liter for gasoline, P8.80/liter diesel and P5.84/liter for kerosene.

During the August 14 to 18 week, the DOE said the price of Dubai crude has decreased by around $1.70 per barrel (bbl). MOPS diesel decreased as well by nearly $1.00/bbl while MOPS gasoline and kerosene increased by about $1.00/bbl, and $0.25/bbl, respectively.

The local oil industry uses MOPS as benchmark for pricing of local products. Before, the country uses Dubai crude. However, this translates to one to two months lag time in reflecting the cost of products as it entails three weeks of travel time and another week or two for refining the crude and transporting the products to the pump.

The shift to MOPS was undertaken to become more responsive to the movements in the international market and local demand for fuel products. Basing price of products on MOPS will only entail five days for importation travel time and transfer to the pumps.

According to the DOE, there is a roughly a P1 per liter increase or decrease in domestic oil price for every $3 change in MOPS.

Image credits: Nonie Reyes