China's wholesale gasoline price came out of a four-day freefall Tuesday after international crude-oil prices clawed back ground lost last week and advanced above $101 a barrel late Monday following last week's nosedive.
Analysts said the rise resurrected the dilemma facing the country's economic planners over whether to raise the refined oil price, a move that would be unpopular with Chinese drivers.
The county's average 93-Ron gasoline truck wholesale price closed at 9,612 yuan ($1,480) per ton Tuesday, and the price at local refineries in Shandong Province bottomed out after four days' dramatic drop, according to data from C1 Energy, a fuel consultancy.
Previously the average wholesale price dropped from 9,653 yuan per ton Friday for four consecutive days, with Shandong local refineries reducing wholesale prices by an average of 300 yuan per ton, the data said.
Shandong is a key link in China's fuel supply chain and nearly half of the country's private oil refineries are located there.
"That the wholesale gasoline price stopped declining, particularly in Shandong, is mainly attributable to the sudden rebound of international crude-oil prices," Liang Dan, an analyst with C1 Energy, said Tuesday.
The public had speculated that the National Development and Reform Commission would raise refined oil prices Monday because the 22-working day moving average price of Brent, Dubai and Cinta crude oil, on which China's fuel price is believed to be based, had gained over 6 percent (a 4 percent rise is the trigger for a price raise) since China's last fuel price hike on April 7.
Last week's dramatic falls in international crude oil prices eased public concerns.
"But now economic planners find themselves once again in a dilemma, since the country is experiencing inflationary pressure but refineries could not afford the high cost of crude oil if the refined oil price remains unchanged," Han Jingyuan, an analyst with JYD Online Co, a commodity e-commerce consultancy, said Tuesday.
