Oil prices up in first week of September

After implementing hefty price cuts last week, oil firms will be raising their prices effective on Sept. 3.

In separate advisories on Monday, Seaoil, CleanFuel, Shell Pilipinas, Caltex and Petro Gazz said the per-liter prices of gasoline would go up by 50 centavos, diesel by 30 centavos and kerosene by 70 centavos.

In a statement over the weekend, the Department of Energy (DOE) said the upward adjustments could be blamed on the “escalating geopolitical tensions and a sudden halt in Libyan oil production/exports [which] sent shock waves through global markets.”

Expectations that US monetary officials would cut interest rates also “lifted the outlook for global economic activity and crude demands, it added.

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Last week, local fuel retailers reduced the prices of pump products by P1.90 to P1.15 per liter. DOE data showed that as of Aug. 27, the year-to-date increases in gasoline and diesel stood at P6.90 and P4.05 a liter, respectively. Kerosene, on the other hand, had a net decrease of P4 per liter.