According to GasWizard.ca, prices in the Greater Toronto Area and Ottawa fell 11 cents a liter on Friday and fell another six cents on Saturday to 187.9 cents a litre. Montreal gas prices also fell six cents on Saturday after falling four cents on Friday. In Vancouver, prices fell seven cents on Friday and another seven cents on Saturday. Winnipeg and Halifax also saw their gas prices drop by three cents on Canada Day, while prices in those areas remained flat on Saturday. The declines come after crude oil prices fell in June after the US Federal Reserve raised interest rates, fueling fears of a recession. “Panic buying, I think, is probably the best way to describe it. A little bit of overzealousness in terms of concerns about the recession and demand destruction,” said GasWizard founder and Canadians for Affordable Energy president Dan McTeague. in a phone interview with CTVNews.ca. on Saturday. In Ontario, which saw the sharpest declines in gas prices, the drop in oil prices coincided with the provincial government’s temporary 5.7 cents per liter gas tax cut. Other provinces have already reduced gas taxes, including Alberta and Newfoundland and Labrador. Despite the tax cut, Roger McKnight, chief oil analyst at En-Pro International, says natural gas prices in Canada are largely tracking what’s happening in the U.S., where there continues to be a wide gap between supply and demand. “Canadian prices are not made in Canada. They really follow what happens with the wholesale price in the United States. And in that regard, we have a situation where crude inventories are down 13 percent over the five-year average. gasoline is down by eight and diesel by 20,” he told CTV News Channel on Saturday. While OPEC had pledged to boost output, the group fell short of its targets as Libya and Nigeria slowed output in June, Reuters reported. Earlier this week, French President Emmanuel Macron told US President Joe Biden that Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are already producing at capacity. “I think the reality is we’re still no better than we were months ago, which is that fuel supply remains a challenge and demand is not easing,” McTeague said. Facing pressure from voters ahead of U.S. midterm elections this fall, Biden is urging domestic oil companies to increase production while pressuring Gulf states to boost supply. The White House is also considering expanding offshore oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. “[Biden’s] they’re trying to look for a secure supply or a steady supply of crude, and that’s a big opportunity,” McKnight said. McKnight says he expects a five-cent increase in gas prices by Monday, and says it’s unclear which way prices will move this summer. “It’s very hard to say,” McKnight said. “There are 16 factors that affect the price of a liter of petrol and if one of them changes, it changes the whole picture” But McTeague predicts natural gas prices will only go up from here in the next couple of months, saying the gap between supply and demand won’t be resolved anytime soon. “What we saw here last week was a bit of a sham … and not a reflection of the fundamentals,” he said. “It’s pretty clear that there will be much higher prices in July and August.” With files from Reuters.
