Fuel price adjustments set tomorrow

MANILA, Philippines — Petroleum companies are rolling back gasoline prices but are raising diesel and kerosene prices tomorrow.

In separate advisories, oil firms announced that gasoline prices would be rolled back by P0.95 per liter while diesel ang kerosene prices would be increased by P0.15 per liter and P0.10 per liter, respectively.

Petro Gazz, Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp. and Seaoil Philippines said their price adjustments would be implemented at 6 a.m. tomorrow.

Phoenix Petroleum Philippines led the price adjustments with a P1 per liter reduction on gasoline yesterday morning while Cleanfuel lowered gasoline prices also by P1 per liter yesterday afternoon.

For the gasoline price drop, China is expected to ramp up gasoline exports to near records until August, Reuters reported. PetroChina Co. led the surge in shipments after getting clearance to increase quotas, and two large-scale refineries owned by Hengli Petrochemical and Zhejiang Petrochemical are starting to operate.

In its report, Reuters said the increase in Chinese exports would fill the gap caused by refinery outages in the United States and the Middle East, but may reduce Asian gasoline margins, which have already dropped 50 percent since July 12.

Meanwhile, global oil prices ended the week higher on the back of stronger-than-expected US economic data and supply concerns over the safety of shipments around the Strait of Hormuz.

Last Tuesday, oil companies rolled back gasoline prices by P0.25 per liter, diesel prices by P0.20 per liter and kerosene by P0.40 per liter.

Prior to this week’s price movement, Department of Energy data showed year-to-date adjustments stand at a net increase of P5.95 per liter for gasoline, P3.80 per liter for diesel and P2.05 per liter for kerosene.