The new drop in fuels anticipates a moderate inflation rate in May

2023-05-18 19:13:18

The price statistics for this month of May may lead to a new moderation in the year-on-year inflation rate, based on the behavior of fuels and energy in recent weeks. In the first case, the prices of diesel and gasoline continue to fall and are already cheaper than before the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, at the end of February 2022.

Specifically, the average price of diesel fell by 1.53% this week compared to seven days ago, to delve into a new minimum this year and fall to its lowest level since the end of January 2022. According to data from the Oil Bulletin of the European Union (EU), this week the average price of a liter of diesel is located, after nine weeks of falls, at 1.41 euros, also consolidating at a lower level than what it cost in the last week of 2022, when the government subsidy of 20 cents per liter was still applied, which was in force from the beginning of April to the end of December of last year.

For its part, the average price of a liter of gasoline has chained its fourth consecutive fall this week and, with a decrease of 1.25%, stands at 1.57 euros, its lowest level since mid-February last year. . Later, the escalation in the price came to situate both products above two euros per liter, an all-time high.

Those circumstances led to an inflation rate that widely exceeded 10% during the summer. In April it closed at 4.1% and in May it will possibly continue to moderate both due to the effect of fuel and electricity prices.

For this Friday, the average cost of electricity generation will be around 60 euros/MWh, which represents an average of 72 euros/MWh so far this month, according to data from the operator Omie. If that price is maintained, it would be similar to that of April, although 63% lower than that registered a year ago now.

So far in 2023, electricity prices have only exceeded the barrier of 100 euros/MWh for one month, in February, due to the absence of rain and weather conditions to be able to activate more renewable plants. Added to this situation is the scarce need to pull from the combined cycle plants, which use natural gas, whose price is also already at a minimum: this Thursday it was trading below 30 euros/MWh; in August it exceeded 300.