CAMARILLO, Calif. -- The U.S. average regular grade retail gasoline price climbed 15.66 cents in the past two weeks, to $3.4737, another all-time record high, according to the most recentLundberg Survey of approximately 7,000 U.S. gas stations.
The top causes: Higher crude oil and higher ethanol prices. Beyond crude (WTI closed at $116.69 on April 29), downstreamers labor under accompanying cost add-ons from Spring reformulations made even steeper by ethanol blending, and from this year's bigger forced serving of the corn derivative [image-nocss] and from bank credit card fees that rise with retail price.
Motorists would have paid some 25 cents more instead of 16, but for shrinkage in refiner and retailer margins. Consumers have been loaned about a dime, thanks to lag time between rising costs and retail price. That loan will be repaid, plus probably much more if crude oil prices don't cave.
Poor margin for refiners is acute. Higher refiner margin is needed to give the green light to maximizing run rates and to foreign gallons to sail to our shores, to meet seasonal demand increases. Regular grade retail margin is the lowest it has been since May 18, 2007; it needs a nickel rise to keep up with the annual average margin of the prior three years. The entire downstream half of the oil business needs better times in order for Summer gasoline supply to be flush for the peak demand period, June-August.
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