Domestic gasoline, diesel prices to stay unchanged

CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) said on Saturday that it would keep its domestic gasoline and diesel prices unchanged this week, even though international crude oil prices still hovered at high levels.

Formosa Petrochemical Corp’s (台塑石化) Web site also indicates that it would maintain its fuel prices at the same levels.

The decisions marked the third consecutive week that CPC and Formosa have kept their domestic fuel prices steady as part of the government’s efforts to ease inflationary pressure.

Last week, international crude oil prices stayed volatile with Brent, the global benchmark, moving lower, but the West Texas Intermediate in the US moving higher amid conflict in the Middle East.

State-run CPC said its floating price mechanism, based on a weighted average of 70 percent Dubai and 30 percent Brent crude, showed that the average international crude oil price fell from US$115.33 per barrel last week to US$112.54 this week.

However, a weaker New Taiwan dollar, which averaged NT$31.850 against the US dollar last week, compared with NT$31.741 in the previous week, slightly raised purchasing costs for CPC.

Retail gasoline prices this week are to remain at NT$31.2, NT$32.7 and NT$34.7 per liter for 92, 95 and 98-octane unleaded gasoline respectively at CPC and Formosa stations, while prices of premium diesel would stay at NT$29.9 per liter at CPC stations and NT$29.7 per liter at Formosa pumps, the companies said.