Two days before the May Day holiday, domestic refined oil prices slightly decreased, and self driving became one of the preferred modes of transportation for more and more people during the holiday.
The domestic May Day holiday tourism market continues to be booming. According to data from the Ministry of Transport, on the first day of the holiday (May 1st), the total cross regional personnel flow in society was 315.742 million, an increase of 54.7% month on month, 30.3% compared to the same period in 2019, and 16% compared to the same period in 2023.
On May 5th, a Tianjin citizen who was refueling at a gas station told a reporter from First Financial News, “Tickets in popular cities during holidays are not easy to buy. Take your elderly and children to the surrounding counties of Ji County to experience the natural scenery and rural life. A few days ago, oil prices dropped and high-speed small buses were also free to pass, so the cost of traveling for a family is not high.”
Two days before the May Day holiday, the National Development and Reform Commission lowered finished oil prices. Starting from 24:00 on April 29th, domestic gasoline and diesel prices have been lowered by 70 yuan per ton. According to Longzhong Information, the corresponding price adjustment for 92 octane gasoline, 95 octane gasoline, and 0 octane diesel will be reduced by 0.05 to 0.06 yuan per liter.
According to Longzhong Information, taking a typical private car with a fuel tank capacity of 50 liters as an example, filling up one tank of fuel will save about 2.5 yuan; According to models that consume 7-8 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers in urban areas, the average cost per 100 kilometers traveled is reduced by about 0.4 yuan.
Self driving has become one of the preferred modes of transportation for more and more people during the May Day holiday. The Ministry of Transport announced at a press conference at the end of April that it is expected that during this year’s May Day holiday, the daily flow of people across regions in the whole society will reach more than 270 million, with self driving travel accounting for over 80%.
“There are many more people coming to refuel on May Day than usual,” an employee of a Sinopec gas station in Beichen District, Tianjin told First Financial reporters. After adjustments, the prices of 92 octane and 95 octane gasoline have dropped to 8.18 yuan/liter and 8.65 yuan/liter respectively, a decrease of 5 and 6 cents per liter compared to before the price adjustment.
The next round of refined oil price adjustment will start at 24:00 on May 15th. Due to the fact that this round of price adjustment spans the May Day holiday and is relatively long, coupled with limited guidance on the news surface, the final result of the new round of price adjustment is highly uncertain.
Longzhong Information believes that the impact of the Iran Israel conflict has basically come to an end, and the support from favorable geographical factors has been reduced. The market’s focus has returned to fundamentals. In addition, the global economic data has performed poorly, putting pressure on the outlook for crude oil demand, and it is expected that the next round of refined oil price adjustments will have a high probability of reduction.
However, according to a report by CITIC Securities Futures, on May 3rd, OPEC+reaffirmed its control over the market through a production reduction compensation plan, which had a greater impact on oil prices. The report stated that during the May Day holiday, there were many factors driving the weakening of crude oil prices, including US inventories and overall global inventory accumulation, as well as the bearish monthly supply report released by the US on April 30th. However, the key issue is that the market has not yet paid attention to the production reduction compensation plan provided by overproducing countries on April 30th. The current results indicate that OPEC+has consistently hoped to support crude oil prices by controlling supply.