The one thing that had been working for Donald Trump of late was gas prices trending way, way down. Emphasis on had been.
“There’s still a window of opportunity to revisit — or even beat — recent gas price lows, but that window will begin to close soon,” said Patrick De Haan, the head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, which reports on Monday that gas prices are up nationally by 3.1 cents per gallon, with a six-cent spike in Virginia over the past week.
The culprit: oil prices, which hit a low of $55.13 a barrel back on Dec. 16, got back over $60 last week, and are at $59.34 this morning.
That’s off a six-month high of $70 dating to July 30, and a 12-month high of $75.83, back on Jan. 21 of last year.
Analysts see prices heading back toward those levels in the coming six to 12 months; that, coupled with the change in seasonal grades to more expensive summer grades, will push our prices higher.
“California will soon start transitioning back to cleaner summer gasoline, with most of the rest of the country following in a little over a month,” De Haan said. “However, with a surplus of winter gasoline built up after large inventory increases in recent weeks, we’re likely to see localized discounts as that fuel is cleared from the system before the seasonal rise becomes more organized in the weeks ahead.”
The average price in Virginia was at $2.75 a gallon at the open of business on Monday, per GasBuddy.
The average nationwide was at $2.76 per gallon.
It’s rare for our average Virginia price to be that close to the national average, because of our lower gas-tax rates.
The national average price of diesel is down one cent, and stands at $3.47 per gallon.
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Chris Graham
