Gasoline Prices Hit 5-Year Low, Lundberg Says

Gasoline prices nationwide dropped to the lowest level in five years with major oil companies at the head of the price-cutting pack, and the trend will continue with the slump in crude oil prices, an industry analyst said Sunday.

The average price for all grades of gasoline could dip to 94 cents a gallon, about a 21 cent decrease from current prices, Los Angeles-based analyst Dan Lundberg said.

“Gasoline pump prices dipped for the eighth consecutive week since last October, bringing the price of regular leaded to a national average self-serve price of $1.02,” Lundberg said.

Prices at the pump dropped 5 cents a gallon over the past four months, and at least a 2-cent drop in retail prices is a near certainty by the end of January because that decrease has already occurred in wholesale gas prices, he said.

“This is not some caprice, some move of a single company on a volume-building adventure,” he said. “This is a general decline, where in all five principal regions of the country different oil companies have found themselves in the leading position as to cutting price.”

The national averages for self-serve prices are: regular leaded, $1.024; regular unleaded, $1.104; premium unleaded, $1.248, and premium leaded, $1.339. Lundberg estimates about 74% of all stations are now self-service.

The drop in pump prices is paralleling a downward slide in crude oil spot-market prices.