MANILA, Philippines -- (UPDATE 2) Major and independent oil players will roll back gasoline prices by P5 per liter and diesel and kerosene by P2 effective 12:01 a.m. Saturday, their officials have announced.
Virginia Ruivivar, Petron spokesperson; Bobby Kanapi, Shell vice president for communications; and Toby Nebrida of Chevron issued separate statements Friday.
PTT Philippines Corp., Flying V, Seaoil Petroleum Corp. also said they were adjusting their pump prices.
Seaoil, which by its lonesome reduced the price of diesel by P1 a liter on Tuesday, said it was not making any change for that product this time around.
Chevron will also be cutting its Silver E10 gasoline price by P4.50 liter, Nebrida said.
“Since August, gasoline and diesel prices have been decreased by P24.50 per liter and P21.50 per liter respectively,” Ruivivar said.
Independent oil player Total Philippines announced that it would be implementing the same rollbacks on oil products effective 6 a.m. Saturday.
According to the Department of Energy, week-on-week average prices of gasoline and diesel were lower by $8 and $4 per barrel, respectively.
"Gasoline, which has been posting lower than Dubai this month, already dropped by about 72% since July.," the DOE said in a bulletin.
"The same is true with diesel which plunged 62% from peak level, following the US Energy Department report on the sharp drop in fuel demand across the United States," it said.
The agency cited a forecast by the London-based Center for Global Energy Studies that a contraction in global demand for the first time in 25 years is seen amid the severe global economic slowdown.
The latest price cuts will bring pump rates in Metro Manila of unleaded gasoline to a range of P29.57 to P36.15 a liter, diesel to between P32.47 and P41.50 a liter, and kerosene to between P39.15 and P45.15 a liter.
Data from the DOE show that prices of the regional benchmark Dubai crude averaged $50 per barrel in Nov. 1-26 trading.
This shows a decrease of $17 per barrel from the October average of $67 and of $81.27 since Dubai prices peaked at an average of $131.27 in July.
As of Nov. 26, the average Mean of Platts Singapore prices for unleaded gasoline settled also at $49 per barrel or $31 lower than the October average of $80.
Average MOPS rate for gasoline has sunk by $91.30 per barrel since this peaked at $140.30 in June.
Also, average the MOPS price for diesel in the same trading period was pegged at $74 per barrel or $15 lower than the October average of $89.
Average MOPS prices for diesel have gone down by $95.36 per barrel since this peaked at $169.36 in June.
