CPC to keep domestic gasoline, diesel prices unchanged next week

Taipei, Aug. 8 (CNA) State-owned oil supplier CPC Corp., Taiwan, announced Saturday that it will leave domestic retail gasoline and diesel prices unchanged next week.

Under the decision, retail prices will remain at NT$30.5 (US$0.94), NT$32.0 and NT$34.0 per liter for 92, 95 and 98-octane unleaded gasoline, respectively, from midnight Monday through Aug. 16, CPC said in a statement.

The retail price of premium diesel will also remain at NT$29.3 per liter during the same period, CPC said.

It marks the second consecutive week that CPC has kept domestic fuel prices unchanged.

CPC said its floating pricing mechanism, based on a weighted average of 70 percent Dubai crude and 30 percent Brent crude, showed that the average international crude oil price fell from US$83.99 per barrel last week to US$82.20 this week after the United States canceled plans to strike Iran.

A weaker U.S. dollar, which averaged NT$32.350 against the Taiwan dollar this week, compared with NT$32.360 last week, also increased CPC's purchasing power, according to CPC data.

Despite the decline in international crude prices, CPC estimated it will still incur losses of NT$0.5 per liter on gasoline and NT$1.6 per liter on diesel next week.

The company said crude oil prices remained well above levels seen before tensions escalated in the Middle East and that it continued to implement the government's price stabilization measures aimed at capping domestic fuel prices and easing inflationary pressure.

CPC estimated that, as of Sunday, it will have absorbed NT$16.43 billion in losses since the outbreak of the war in the Middle East by not fully passing higher international crude oil prices on to consumers and businesses.