Today’s National Unleaded Retail Gas Price Averages

Today’s Indiana Unleaded Retail Gas Price Averages

Highest Recorded Price:

AAA’s Daily Fuel Gauge Report
Current nationwide (www.fuelgaugereport.com), individual state (State-by-State Averages) and Indiana metropolitan (Indiana Metro Averages) gas price averages can always be found online at AAA’s Daily Fuel Gauge Report. The report is based on data from Oil Price Information Service, the nation’s most comprehensive source of petroleum pricing information. AAA purchases the data and makes it available free on the Internet as a public service. Average daily prices for the nation, all 50 states and more than 250 localities are available for all grades of gasoline, making the site the most current and complete public source of fuel price information.

The Spanish language version of the AAA Fuel Gauge Report, Galga De Gasolina can be accessed at www.galgadegasolina.com.

Market Overview
Continued fighting between Israeli and Palestinian forces in the Gaza Strip over the past week, and optimism for resumption in economic growth during the new year has propped up the price of crude oil and given a slight lift to the nationwide average price of self-serve regular gasoline. 

In fact, today’s average price of $1.862 per gallon in Indiana is nearly 27 cents higher than one week ago. 

On a national scale, oil is $8 per barrel higher since last week; trading near $48 per barrel yesterday.

Another influential factor for energy prices this week is a stronger dollar. U.S. currency traded yesterday at its highest levels against the Yen and the Euro since early December. Factors contributing to the rise in the value of the dollar are the same as those pushing up oil prices; fighting in the Middle East and hope for a better economic future. 

The dollar is viewed as a safe-haven currency during times of conflict and some currency investors obviously believe the dollar could rally some more on the eventual passage of President-elect Obama’s proposed economic stimulus package.

Whether any of these somewhat emotional arguments for higher oil and gasoline prices will have a lasting impact remains to be seen since slack demand for energy worldwide must tighten if prices are going to move higher for the long term. This is especially true for the oil price which can remain low even if gasoline inventories in the United States start to dwindle due to refinery cutbacks and pump prices increase.

Regardless of these factors, however, many industry experts believe the eventual return of something resembling peace in the Middle East and the coming release of year-end economic data will probably dampen oil and gasoline prices in the next few weeks. This would make a return to lower prices possible before the end of February, although not as certain as it was before the Gaza Strip erupted in turmoil. 

AAA’s Fuel Cost Calculator
In order to help Americans establish travel budgets while making vacation plans, AAA and Oil Price Information Service have combined to offer an online tool that will help travelers estimate the cost of gasoline they will use during long-distance driving vacations. The site can be found at www.fuelcostcalculator.com.