Monday, April 21, 2014, 7:45PM: The good news is that the ethanol hikes seem to be over, and that last Monday’s hike was as bogus as it felt, with prices dropping 30 or more cents in the past seven days. The bad news is that, given that I have more confidence again in my calculations, dropping prices combined with rising wholesale prices means that we have a price hike coming Tuesday or Wednesday. We could head back to $3.89 again. — Ed A.
We have only dropped 9 cents off this last spike which is rare for it to drop so slow. We’re either really going to get hosed as in $3.95 or not go up at all…I vote for the latter!
Patrick mentioned something about a BP Whiting glitch? And suggested mid 3’s and possibly low 3’s pricing past June.
Or so I heard on the radio today.
Speedway spiking in South Bend, IN to $3.89 today. Plenty of non-Speedways in the low $3.60s for now & 2 down to $3.59.
Gasbuddy is reporting Speedway hiking to $3.89 in Grand Rapids.
IT didn’t hold last week, so try try again.
With Michigan and Indiana getting s Speedy Rewards of a $3.89 spike I’d say Ohio get $3.84 Wednesday. Thanks GREEDway.
Was just on the north side of Indy a few hours ago and passed by a Greedway at $3.52. Just 30 minutes later when going the other way they had jacked it up to $3.89. Got lucky and found a Shell down the road at $3.50 so I topped her off. WTI Crude closed at a 7 month high yesterday, but is dropping quite nicely so far today. Not to worry as Friday it will make up the week’s losses as it usually does.
Ever notice how they always seem to time it with a big drop in oil prices. Down 2.34 a barrel as of right now. They don’t always do it but sure seems to happen from time to time…
When I first began following the gas game, I could watch the spike line deviation, and knew to fill up when it got to zero. The was less reliable starting a couple of years ago, so I started filling up when that number decreased to 6 cents. Yesterday that number was 23 cents. Do I have to start filling up when it hits 25c now?
I commute between Lansing & Novi during the week.
This morning at around 4:30AM I pulled into the SpeedWay in Novi.
Lately they been as low or sometimes even lower then Lansing.
Well, screw that. Once again this particular SpeedWay had it’s problems.
I purchase the SpeedWay Fuel Card just so I can get that measly 3 cents per gallon off.
The pumps would not accept any card of any kind.
Ticked me off to no end.
I had enough fuel to get back home but I ‘Smelled’ a price hike.
Yup, as soon as I left work in Novi today around 2pm it was $3.89.
Gawd I was ticked…LOL
When I was almost home I was hoping an Admiral station would still be around $3.70 but a mile before them there is this little Sunoco station I rarely use.
They still had $3.69 so I topped off. Plus they did not look busy at all.
I was glad because when I got near the Admiral 10 minutes later they already had raised their price to $3.89.
Which is unusual. Many times they have held out.
I am willing to bet I was one of the last ones to get $3.69 in Lansing today!
Yep, GREEDway just can’t have their territory falling below the national average.
The spike when crude falls is quite funny and can be seen clearly if you plot gas vs crude – but I’m not going to attribute this to dark forces. There’s plenty of spikes to go around for everyone.
YEP — Three business days after Fort Wayne average dips below Indiana average. And Turbo…Crude takes about two weeks, give or take, to work into the pump price.
BP Whiting and Exxon Joliet were both down over the weekend but are up and running now.
Ohio spiking to $3.859 right now, F U GREEDway.
The spike in Indy has been interesting. Stations (including Speedway) didn’t seem to take to the new price yesterday afternoon. I still passed stations this morning in the $3.50s. Is Speedway trying to improve its image by instigating a hike early and then looking like the reluctant one until they hold out until the next day to hike?
GREEDway may have every reason to charge these out of control prices but I have every reason in the world to pass on their coffee and sodas. If fact, I hope their pizza that they are pushing stays unsold until it becomes gray and fuzzy.
Unfortunately Becky, the unwashed masses are too large in number for that to ever happen. As long as they get their free Speedy Freeze, they are oblivious to their pricing practices. Two, 20-cent spikes in 5 days in Ohio. Unnecessary.
Today’s spike in Ohio puts us 20 cents ABOVE where we year this date last year. And for no good reason, either(well, other than that, as the market leader, Speedway can charge whatever they want, knowing that USUALLY everyone else follows their spikes).
Well, to Speedway’s defense, crude was cheaper a year ago, 88.00 vs 103.00 these days (wonder why), and yet the price difference between a year ago and now is not all that significant. Last year we got hosed pretty well from January to May or June due to refinery (cough) issues. Then right after the refinery (cough) issues were addressed we had high crude prices for a while…
A few stations that went from $3.59 to $3.89 are back down to $3.59 again here in South Bend. Most are still up though.
Boy, Lou, I wish that were the case in Fort Wayne. It seems like we (the customers) are being diciplined for having prices below the Indiana average for three days.
Same here in Delaware County. After these last two spikes, they’ve barely budged downward. We dropped a whole 9 cents last week while others were down as much as 30 cents. Only down 4 cents so far this post-spike. Muncie still has stations at $3.89 though.
WOW, it’s Friday and WTI Crude is down $1.20 at the moment….might be time to get some lottery tickets!!
Sunday Afternoon and my local station was still at $3.85. I drove into downtown and bought 13 gallons for $3.63 while I was there. Pricing right now makes no sense except for “BEACAUSE THEY CAN”
Another Heads Up! Fort Wayne’s average went below Indiana’s average early this morning. That would place a price spike within the next couple to three days. Baring a whole sale price decrease of magnitude. With all the days of rain/storms out there, highly unlikely.
Serious question: what do rain/storms have to do with this?
As much as squirrels have to do with pricing. LOL. Shutting down refineries or parts thereof, at least in the Midwest.
Any predictions for Fort Wayne’s spike this week Timm? $3.95 range perhaps?
I’m working in Chicago this week and WOW….crazy prices round here! I left my hotel and passed by a gas station showing $4.23 and 15 minutes later when I pulled into Meijer in Highland, IN it was $3.69. Pretty tough to figure out where I’ll be getting gas lol
Figuring that the last high point in crude was on the 21st, we still have at least a week to work that cost through the system. That would indicate a next spike of $3.95 or $3.99 or there abouts, barring any magic squirrel type phenomenon, of coure.
So, see oil is down a dollar a barrel this morning. Time for a .35 cent a gallon gas hike today Greedway?
Anybody out there notice that we (Indiana and Fort Wayane in particular) are within striking distance of the national average price? Just a couple cents. Could Speedway and Lassus (local first price spiker) allow it to happen…….I dunno. VERY SELDOM does Fort Wayne go longer than 3 business days below the Indiana average. Today would be day 3. We shall see.
Although there is an apparent relation between Indiana’s price spikes and the national average, that’s not WHY the price spikes occur. They don’t look at the chart and say, “we need to spike because we dipped below the national average. They look at profit margin and say “we need to spike because our margins have become too thin.”
Although it’s been a trend in recent months, don’t expect the apparent correlation between local and national prices to continue long-term.
Just because I speak comedically with sarcasm bordering on cynicism, do not confuse it with ignorance of how things in this marketplace work much better than the above average person frequenting here. I’ve known that and refined that for a long long long time now.
But here could be your reason – LOL!!
http://news.msn.com/us/train-derails-in-lynchburg-virginia-official-statement
Frankly, I think the sarcasm and cynicism are a bit overdone around here, especially the tired old squirrel meme. And adding that kind of immodesty on top of it threatens to make this place just another blustery dead end on the internet.
Indiana is knocking on the spike line door right now, so perhaps a Saturday crank up of 25-30 cents is possible? Prepare thy gas cans in Fort Wayne Timm!
Hopefully crude will continue to drop and Chicago Spot will follow.
We’ll stop the squirrel jokes once a more interesting explanation involving larger and meaner wildlife species is produced…
And to think that from WW2 to the 1960’s they used ferrets to route wiring thru wings during aircraft construction.
http://www.all-about-ferrets.com/present-day-ferret-achievements.html
I don’t think that is true Ren when it comes to Speedway, they are most always .10 higher then surrounding stations that may or may not dip below their profit margins, yet its most always Speedway that spikes first.
Some Fort Wayne stations dropped 5 cents yesterday, and another 5 cents overnight. Some in the region of $3.53 now. Buckle Up!
Today is day 4 since FW av dipped below IN av. AND lots of stations giving price drop “Last Gasp”.
SOON! back up to $3.89 or $3.95
My guess is 3.95. Got to start getting us conditioned for the jump over 4.00 for Memorial Day weekend
Interesting article on AAA report of gas prices now and by Memorial Day.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/oil-below-100-gas-prices-near-peak-aaa-192844022–finance.html
A. I’ll believe it when I see it,
B. This is one of the very few things I would not mind being wrong on.
Well, the US average has stabilized for a week now, the longest period without an increase since early February.
http://charts.gasbuddy.com/ch.gaschart?Country=Canada&Crude=f&Period=6&Areas=,USA%20Average,&Unit=US%20$/G
It could be a peak, or it could be just a pause. But either way, it’s something we haven’t seen in almost three months.
This is only the second time I can remember that my FW vs IN predictor was wrong. And for now, I’m OK with that. LOL.
SW Ohio spiking 3.859, a full 1.06 above wholesale.
Sounds like Ohio is taking a page from Indiana’s book Chris lol. Ohio as a whole is still showing gas prices dropping…wonder what’s up with the Cincy area? I guess we’ll probably all see red arrows pointing upward then in the next 24 hours
Don’t know, but I passed multiple (all GREEDway) stations had jacked up to 3.859, up from the 3.579 range earlier. Speedway’s site shows it’s spreading rapidly.
Must have been one helluva squirrel today.
The magic spread was 80 cents (spot/retail) to trigger the last few spikes in Ohio. Guess it’s 90 cents now.
The latest on the surprise Cincinnati Spike of May 1. At first I thought this could be a BP led spike. Only a handful of GREEDways joined in. They tried to ainitiate a couple of spikes last year that did not take. Today many more GREEDways have followed and it looks like this unwarranted spike is slowly taking hold. Squirrel indeed.
The good news for us; most of Fairfield North of us is still in the upper $3.58s. Oxford is in the low $3.50s. Part Northeast of Cincinnati remain in the $3.50s as well. Will they resist? Who knows. No sign of a spike in the rest of Ohio.
Indy is further below the US average than it’s been in three months, and the US average is still stable after a full week without an increase.
Granted, Indy is only 1.7 cents below the US as I write this, but it’s better than some alternatives.