Oil firms owe public P4.40/liter of fuel- IBON

Despite initiating several rollbacks in recent months, oil firms still owe the public some P4.40 per liter of fuel, militant think tank IBON Foundation said on Monday. In a statement, Ibon said that while oil firms "underpriced" their fuel prices by P1.39 per liter from January to March 2007, this is still not enough to offset high oil prices in the past. Ibon said that in the first three months of 2007, oil firms rolled back pump prices of oil products by P1.17 per liter, despite an actual increase by 22 centavos in the international market. From $51.69 per barrel in January, the spot price of Dubai crude jumped to $58.19 in March (1-19 average only) while the peso strengthened against the US dollar from P48.91 to 48.66. But Ibon said the annual overpricing or underpricing of petroleum products from 2000 to 2007 shows the actual cumulative increases during this period reached P18.08 per liter, P4.40 higher than the ideal adjustment of P13.67. In computing the overpricing, Ibon used the difference between the monthly averages of Dubai crude spot price and forex to determine their impact on the pump price. "In March, for instance, a dollar adjustment in the Dubai crude price translates to a 34-centavo per liter change in the pump price while a peso adjustment in the forex translates to a 42-centavo change," it said. "The overpricing of oil products worsens the impact of frequent oil price hikes on people's livelihood, the viability of small businesses, and the overall growth of the domestic economy," it added. The think tank called anew for the scrapping of the oil deregulation law, which it said gives oil firms leeway to pad the true cost of oil.-GMANews.TV