High prices at gas stations were told not to live long
The Federal Antimonopoly Service intervened in an unpleasant situation for the state and car owners with prohibitively expensive gasoline. According to the department, in connection with the decline in exchange prices for petroleum products, it sent a letter to commodity companies and independent gas stations about the need to reduce the cost of fuel at gas stations “to an economically justified level.” Whether private business will listen to officials is a big question.
As the head of the Federal Antimonopoly Service Maxim Shaskolsky noted, oil companies are obliged to provide for domestic consumers, including agricultural producers. Now, according to him, “measures have been taken, they have led to a reduction in prices in all segments of the gas motor fuel market, this allows for future purchases at good prices.” Gasoline and diesel fuel began to become cheaper on September 21, when the Russian government introduced restrictions on exports.
“It is still difficult to judge the consequences of the FAS initiative. We do not have prescriptive pricing, and formally private companies have every right to set prices at their own discretion in order to recoup costs and generate profits,” says Igor Nikolaev, chief researcher at the Institute of Economics of the Russian Academy of Sciences. – However, the antimonopoly service, not without reason, expects the effect of its appeal, taking into account the purely Russian specifics of the relationship between the state and business. The latter is accustomed to acting with an eye on officials who, if desired, can easily ruin his life. Most likely, the wishes will be taken into account, and for some time the increase in retail prices may at least slow down. But in the long term, the situation at gas stations will be determined by the general state of the economy, the exchange rate of the ruble, the ongoing ban on the export of petroleum products, and the clearly insufficient size of the fuel damper for manufacturers.”
According to a financial analyst, candidate of economics Sciences Mikhail Belyaev, he does not know to what extent the FAS letter will be enough to curb retail prices, but he generally approves of the initiative. “The root of the problem lies not in the relationship between supply and demand for gasoline, but in the fact that the monopolies operating in the market unjustifiably, using any pretext, inflate the cost of fuel,” the analyst believes.