Burning trails: the number of FAS cases against gas station owners has tripled
Since the beginning of summer, when fuel shortages began, the Federal Antimonopoly Service has filed almost three times as many cases against oil companies and independent gas stations as in the first five months of the year. Currently, the FAS is reviewing 41 cases and has issued 68 warnings on grounds of violation of antimonopoly legislation. At the same time, in recent days, motorists have faced the second wave of the fuel crisis — only 28% of gas stations have gasoline, monitoring data show. The situation is still affected by unplanned refinery repairs and logistical problems — with significant volumes of gasoline production, it is difficult to deliver it to some regions, experts explain. How the government solves the problem and how soon Indian gasoline, which has already been delivered by tankers to Murmansk, will appear at Russian gas stations, is described in the Izvestia article.
The activity of the Federal Antimonopoly Service has tripled
From the beginning of the year to August 17, the Federal Antimonopoly Service of Russia initiated 41 cases against oil companies and independent market participants, and issued 68 warnings to business entities on grounds of violation of antimonopoly legislation, the agency's press service told Izvestia.
At the same time, as of May 21, the FAS and the territorial authorities were considering 11 such cases against participants in the petroleum products market. Thus, it was in the summer that 30 proceedings were initiated — almost three times more than in the first five months of the year.
All cases relate to violations of articles of the law "On Protection of Competition" and the Administrative Code, which prohibit the conclusion of cartel agreements and abuse of a dominant position in the market, Izvestia found out. Most of the violations were recorded by independent companies that own gas stations in various regions, as well as two companies selling fuel under the Gazpromneft brand, Gazpromneft – Regional Sales LLC and two oil traders.
The Antimonopoly Service began to actively respond to price increases and violations of the law due to the government's close attention to this problem, said Dmitry Gusev, Deputy Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Reliable Partner Association. In addition, due to the increase in stock prices for fuel and the shortage of supplies, the owners of independent gas stations began to significantly raise prices, which increased the number of complaints from citizens to the Federal Antimonopoly Service.
Sergey Tereshkin, CEO of Open Oil Market, believes that the increase in the number of warnings and antitrust cases was predictable after the June jump in fuel prices: the regulator is thereby trying to "moderate the appetites" of a number of market participants and thereby help stabilize prices.
A new wave of queues at gas stations
At the same time, in recent days, a new wave of fuel shortages and queues at gas stations has been observed in a number of regions. For example, in Moscow, almost all brands of gasoline are periodically absent at some gas stations. On August 17, Izvestia correspondents visited 21 gas stations in Moscow and the region: 92nd was at seven, 95th at six gas stations, 98th - at only five. Even diesel is not found everywhere. The editorial board sent a request to the Moscow government.
On August 14, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak held a regular meeting on the situation on the domestic fuel market. A representative of the Ministry of Energy said that the situation with fuel supplies to gas stations remains tense in a number of regions of the country, the Cabinet of Ministers said in a statement. In particular, the issue of providing fuel to the Orenburg, Lipetsk, Tver and Orel regions, Tuva, Khakassia, Krasnodar, Zabaikalsky, Primorsky and Krasnoyarsk Territories was raised.
According to the GdeBENZ app, as of August 16, fuel was at 28.1% of gas stations across the country. At the same time, a week ago this figure was 41%. The availability of gasoline and diesel decreased in the Volgograd, Chelyabinsk, Orenburg, Voronezh, Samara, Penza, Saratov, Lipetsk, Rostov regions and Tatarstan, according to the appendix.
The first wave of queues at gas stations in Russia appeared at the end of May and lasted about a month and a half. At the end of July, Deputy Prime Minister Novak said that the fuel balance and the situation at gas stations in Russia had improved.
According to Rosstat, during the week from August 4 to August 10, a decrease in gasoline prices was recorded in 44 regions of the Russian Federation, most of all in the Republic of Dagestan (-9.1%). In Moscow, prices decreased by 0.2%. The largest price increase was noted in the Tver region — by 6.8%.
In general, this suggests that the fuel situation in Russia is developing unevenly: with the overall considerable production volumes of gasoline, it is more difficult to deliver it to some regions, including due to logistical problems, an industry source told Izvestia.
The Ministry of Energy told Izvestia that, together with regional authorities, other departments and oil companies, they are taking measures to provide the domestic market with the necessary volumes of petroleum products.
The government has already imposed a temporary ban on fuel exports, allowed Euro-2, Euro-3 and Euro-4 environmental gasoline to be put into circulation, installed an import damper to stimulate fuel supplies to the Russian Federation, and changed exchange mechanisms.
Izvestia sent inquiries to the office of Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak and major oil companies.
A new wave of shortages has arisen due to ongoing attacks and unscheduled repairs at refineries, said Igor Yushkov, a leading analyst at the National Energy Security Fund. In addition, August is traditionally characterized by peak demand in the domestic market, especially for gasoline.
According to Sergey Tereshkin, the lack of high—octane fuel grades at a number of gas stations is a consequence of the fact that even after the first wave of the crisis, the market balance remained very fragile. The reconfiguration of logistics made it possible to stabilize the situation with fuel availability in large cities, but did not seriously affect the balance of supply and demand.
Dmitry Gusev notes that the market needs more systematic support measures. He considers a more active consumer transition to alternative types of engines and fuels to be a key need. There are also still logistical difficulties with fuel supplies, the expert added.
Fuel from India is expected to reach Russian gas stations in the near future. A large shipment of it arrived in Murmansk a few days ago, but was not shipped from tankers, an industry source told Izvestia. The cost of the batch was high, and its purchase for resale in the domestic market of the Russian Federation for oil companies could mean a sale in the negative.
According to media reports, the Indian AI-92 was initially offered at 130 thousand rubles per ton. Later, the price dropped to 110 thousand. At the same time, as of August 17, the AI-92 territorial stock index for the European part of Russia amounted to about 73 thousand rubles per ton, according to data from the St. Petersburg International Mercantile Exchange. However, as the source added, acceptable fuel shipment terms were still agreed upon.
Sergey Tereshkin believes that the further development of the situation will depend on the duration of technological downtime at the refinery. At the same time, in his opinion, imports from Belarus and mitigation of environmental requirements will have a more serious impact on the physical availability of fuel than supplies from India, which require additional logistics and pricing mechanisms to reach a significant level.
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