Oil PSUs slash ATF prices further as crude climbs to $50 a barrel
15 Dec 2008
State-run oil companies have announced an 11 per cent reduction in aviation turbine fuel (ATF) prices, the seventh straight reduction since September, even as crude prices rose $2 in the international markets to above $50 a barrel.
ATF in Delhi will cost Rs4,208.37 less at Rs32,691.28 per kilolitre effective midnight tonight, sources at Indian Oil Corporation, the nation's largest fuel retailer, said.
In Mumbai, ATF will cost Rs33,719.46 per kl from tomorrow against Rs38,103.19 per kl at present.
Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum have revise jet fuel prices twice a month over the last two months - based on the average imported price in the preceding fortnight.
ATF prices have come down from an all-time high of Rs71,028.26 per kl (in Delhi) in August to Rs32,691.28 per kilolitre now in seven straight reductions in its prices after prices of crude oil started falling in the international markets.
Prices of crude oil, meanwhile, rose to around $50 in New York, after Abdalla El-Badri, secretary-general of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, said the group may announce ''sizable'' production cut at this week's meeting in Algeria.
Market expects OPEC, which supplies 42 per cent of the world's oil, to lower output targets by at least 2 million barrels a day, or 7.3 per cent, when it meets on 17 December.
US sweet light crude oil for January delivery rose as much as $3.77, or 8.2 per cent, to $50.05 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It's the first time oil has traded above $50 a barrel since 2 December.
