For the fifth straight week, gas prices have moved lower. The national average price for a gallon of gasoline is down 5.9 cents per gallon over the last week to $2.67 per gallon, the lowest level since April 10, according to GasBuddy data compiled from more than 10 million individual price reports. The national average price of diesel saw modest relief as well, falling 2.0 cents to an average of $3.25 per gallon.
“The last week has seen another notable decline at pumps in nearly every state with average prices again plummeting, in some places to $1.99 per gallon or less, following oil’s longest losing streak in nearly 34 years,” said Patrick DeHaan, head of petroleum analysis for GasBuddy. “Every single day, Americans are spending nearly $100 million less than just 30 days ago- a significant and impressive feat as the national average gas price has shed over 20 cents per gallon over the last month. Oil’s demise has partially been due to the U.S. issuing waivers to countries buying crude oil from Iran, making sanctions moot, but also because ahead of those waivers, OPEC agreed to increase production to soften the potential blow from the Nov. 4 re-imposition of sanctions- yet now OPEC is upset and may again cut production due to the move by Trump to allow temporary waivers. What’s it all mean for motorists? The plummet at the pump may continue for now, but all eyes will be on OPEC to see what move they make to pump oil prices back up.”
After a week which saw Brent crude oil drop 4% in value and WTI crude oil shed a full 5%, an informal gathering of OPEC members yesterday saw the cartel move to decrease oil output by 1 million barrels, beginning next month. Significantly, Saudi Arabia will act unilaterally and cut half a million barrels beginning in December, a move that has effectively stopped oil’s plummet in value and added a dollar per barrel to Brent’s price this morning to $71.21 and given WTI an 80 cent boost to $60.97 a barrel this morning.
The reality for producing nations that were brow-beaten into raising production on the assumption that U.S. trade sanctions on Iran were iron-clad, is that they may have been duped and now genuinely concerned about the record consecutive declines in oil’s value, especially with WTI crude oil which registered a 10 day successive drop in prices, a record that stood since 1984.
The bad news for producers is diametrically opposed to the positive effects lower pump prices are having for drivers. According to GasBuddy’s Live Ticking Average, median gas prices are now well below the $2.70 a gallon thresholds and now sit at $2.679, which is nearly 6 cents cheaper than last week and a whopping 22.2 cents below last month’s average. At under $2.68 a gallon, the premium paid this year over prices last year is now only 12.2 cents with a likelihood that this disparity will disappear over the next week or so, should market trends continue.
All 50 states saw average gas prices decline in the last week, but leading decliners was: Michigan (-10 cents), Ohio (-10 cents), Kansas (-9 cents), Indiana (-9 cents) and Minnesota (-9 cents).
States with the lowest average gas prices: Oklahoma ($2.30), Delaware ($2.34), Louisiana ($2.36), Texas ($2.37) and South Carolina ($2.38).
States with the highest average gas prices: Hawaii ($3.82), California ($3.69), Washington ($3.46), Alaska ($3.32) and Oregon ($3.29).
