Australia’s metro fuel prices were barely affected by the Saudi Arabian oil facility attack in mid-September.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission says prices this past quarter would have dropped even further if Australia’s dollar was stronger, but the Saudi attack “only temporarily affected international oil prices” before returning to normal by the end of the month.
The ACCC’s quarterly petrol monitoring report shows Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth average retail fuel price in the three months ending September was down 3.2 cents per litre compared with the June quarter to 142cpl.
Australia’s petrol market, the ACCC reports, has seen fuel excise increase to 41.8cpl on petrol and diesel, based on biannual indexing.
In the last few months several fuel giants like Caltex and BP have partnered with other sector brands like DAvid Jones and Qantas, and UberEats, respectively.
Viva Energy was also cleared by the competition regulator to acquire the remaining 50% of Liberty Oil Holdings’ wholesale business, and BP’s alliance with Qantas will see it supply aviation fuel to the flying kangaroo.
Retail petrol prices have increased from a January low of 115cpl before a peak of 154cpl in mid-May.
Brisbane remains Australia’s most expensive city for retail fuel using aggregate data, averaging 141.8cpl, 1.5cpl higher than the other four largest cities Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth.
However, Adelaide’s retail prices in Adelaide were the highest of the five largest cities with wuarterly average retail petrol prices at 145.5 cpl, which was 7.4 cpl higher than in Sydney (138.1 cpl), 4.9 cpl higher than in Perth (140.6 cpl), 2.3 cpl higher than in Melbourne (143.2 cpl) and 2.2 cpl higher than in Brisbane (143.3 cpl).
“The US is now the world’s largest crude oil producer, and can increase its shale oil supply relatively quickly when needed. This means that incidents like the recent Saudi attack may not have as big an impact on international crude oil prices as they would have in the past,” said ACCC Chair Rod Sims.
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