Petroleum product consumption is set to rise by around 7% this year against 2007 on rising car fleet and expansion plans announced by the main players. Translated into money, the difference from last year amounts to almost 450m euros.
Another factor with a strong impact on the value of this market is last year's petroleum price su2rge, which is expected to be really felt as late as this year. In terms of trends, market dieselisation, anticipated several years ago, is now a reality and now the higher diesel demand has also led to a higher price for this type of fuel compared to petrol.
"The market advanced by 6.5% last year against 2006. In retail, fuel consumption amounts to 3.5-4 million tonnes annually and accounts for around 65%-70% of the overall market. Market growth has accelerated in the past two years. (...)," says Dan Rosu, an executive at Rompetrol Downstream, which ranks second on the market in terms of the number of filling stations.
According to market players, petrol consumption stands at around 1.6 million tonnes annually and diesel consumption stands at 3.4 million tonnes, with the volumes representing both retail and wholesale consumption.
Given these data, the petroleum product market last year reached 6.3bn euros and has the potential to get to around 6.8bn euros this year.
Market players say the market will see further growth this year, with the growth pace to range between 5 and 7%. These estimates could be exceeded, though, given that petroleum price doubling was reflected in the increase of prices at the pump by just 10%. Increases could go beyond this level this year as the petroleum barrel had a strong start to the year, exceeding the 100 dollar psychological threshold, to which two important factors are added: RON fall and the inelasticity of petroleum product demand. Beside the barrel, another important dri
