The price covers the two-week period that ended Friday and is derived from a survey of about 2,500 filling stations nationwide by Trilby Lundberg. She said that prices had dropped 37.2 cents a gallon since they hit almost $4 a gallon on average on May 8.
“The rate of decline was reduced in the latest two weeks, but we have yet to see the impact of the government sale of crude,” Ms. Lundberg said Sunday.
Prices have fallen after member countries of the International Energy Agency said last week they would release 60 million barrels of oil from emergency stockpiles and on concern that the United States and European economies are weakening.
“If we suppose that crude oil prices fall another few dollars, then this could accelerate the drop another 20 cents” for gasoline, Ms. Lundberg said. “Poor economic news continues to be a factor in petroleum prices for crude and gasoline, with or without putting government oil up for bid.”
Separately, AAA reported this weekend that the number of Americans traveling by automobile during the Independence Day holiday would fall 3 percent to 32.8 million, from 33.7 million a year earlier.
Concern that the global economic recovery is sputtering was reflected in remarks by the Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, that the United States recovery was proceeding “somewhat more slowly” than projected, prompting the Fed to maintain record monetary stimulus.
The Energy Department reported last week that gasoline stockpiles in the United States in the week that ended June 17 fell 464,000 barrels to 214.6 million. Wholesale demand fell 0.5 percent to 9.32 million barrels a day.
The highest price among cities surveyed in the 48 contiguous states on June 10 was in Chicago, at $4.06 a gallon. The lowest price, $3.32, was in Jackson, Miss., the Lundberg Survey said.
Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=850b6d6a852c7fbeddd696438b71e917
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