Romanian petrol price up 5 pct on summer of 2008, when oil had record quotations

The petrol marketed in Romania currently costs by 5 percent, pre-tax, more than in the summer of 2008, when the oil quotations hit record highs, shows an analysis conducted by AGERPRES.

Thus, a litre of petrol now sells at the pump for 0.703 euros, pre-tax, on average. At the same time, Brent crude, which is the European market benchmark is quoted at nearly 110 dollars a barrel.

This compares to July of 2008, when the crude price hit an all-time high of 147 dollars per barrel; back then, the petrol sold in Romania for 0.669 euros, pre-tax, according to the European Commission statistics.

Therefore, while the crude quotations have plunged by 25 percent since the summer of 2008, the petrol price has gone up 5 percent.

Petrol marketed in Romania had the lowest price on Jan. 12, 2009, when it cost 0.266 dollars. Crude was quoted at 45 dollars per barrel on the stock exchange at the time.

Diesel fuel, on the other hand, is now 9 percent cheaper than in July 2008. A litre of diesel now sells for 0.727 euros, pre-tax as compared to 0.799 euros in July 2008. Romanians were able to buy the cheapest diesel fuel on March 23, 2009 at 0.404 euros a litre.

At the petrol stations, however, the pre-tax price is added the excise tax and the value-added tax. The VAT was raised to 24 percent in the summer of 2009 up from 19 percent.

The petrol excise tax amounted to 425 euros per tonne in the third quarter of 2008 and it has now reached 557.9 euros per tonne. Diesel excise has gone up from 325 euros per tonne to 473 euros per tonne at present.

A litre of petrol at the pump in Romania, all taxes included, costs 1.448 euros and it costs 0.703 euros, pre-tax. This means taxes now account for 51.5 percent of the...