Gas Prices

BMW has been striving to reconcile its dueling images for years. Best known for its luxurious, sport-oriented cars, the German manufacturer's motorcycles are only beginning to shed their reputation as wheels for safety-conscious old men, thanks to exciting new bikes like the S 1000 RR and K 1600 LT. At this weekend's International Motorcycle Shows event in Long Beach, BMW is likely to confuse its image even further when its first scooters make...

Barely two months after the cost of fuel was a white-hot matter in the presidential race, the issue has receded, just as prices have declined across much of the country. AAA reported Monday that the national average price of a gallon of gas has declined for 28 straight days, 21 cents off the recent peak of $3.94. That steady decline is the longest such streak since May 2010. Should it continue another day, it would be the longest since the summer of 2009. On the surface, that's good news for President Obama.

Against the backdrop of gasoline prices rising in an election year, a new Obama administration report cites "significant progress" in reducing foreign oil imports and increasing domestic oil and gas production. The report by six federal agencies was released early Monday on the first anniversary of a speech by President Obama in which he pledged to reduce American dependence on foreign oil imports by one-third in about a decade. According to the study, the United States reduced net imports of crude oil last year by 10%, or 1 million barrels a day. The U.S. now imports 45% of its petroleum, down from 57% in 2008, and is on track to meet Obama's long-term goal, the administration maintains.

Americans seem to be in a holding pattern when it comes to consumer confidence, feeling generally upbeat about the state of the economy, but warily so, according to a virtually unchanged index from the Conference Board. The monthly index dipped slightly to 69.2 in April after a minor slide to 69.5 in March, according to the New York-based research group . The private board's expectations index fell to 81.1 from 82.5 while its present situation index jumped to 51.4, its highest point since September 2008, from 49.9.

Gasoline prices are keeping up their record-setting ways. California drivers paid an average of $4.358 for a gallon of regular gasoline, up 6.6 cents from a week earlier, the Energy Department said Monday. That's a fresh record high for this time of year and is 48.4 cents above the year-earlier price. Nationally, the average rose 7.2 cents to $3.793, also a record for this week, according to Energy Department statistics. A year earlier, the average U.S. price was 27.3 cents lower.

The pain at the pump can be felt in China too. The government on Tuesday raised retail prices for gasoline and diesel fuel for the second time in less than six weeks in an attempt to keep pace with soaring crude oil prices. Chinese motorists are now paying $4.43 a gallon for 90-octane fuel — nearly equal to the $4.45-a-gallon average for mid-grade fuel in California, according to AAA. In contrast with the U.S., retail pump prices in China are set by central authorities, in part to maintain social stability.

 Gasoline prices are dropping for the second straight week, but don't get too excited. Fuel prices have peaked before mid-May just once in the past 20 years, according to Energy Department statistics, and it hasn't happened since 1998. History suggests that the national average won't peak before mid-May at the earliest. The national average for a gallon of regular gasoline fell to $3.907, down another 2 cents since last week, according to the AAA Fuel Gauge Report. Fuel prices first began to fall in California about a month ago, although the decline has been slow.

As drivers head out on traditional Memorial Day weekend road trips, gasoline is still expensive but continuing to decline, with the national average for a gallon of regular gasoline down to $3.809 on Friday after twice flirting with $4 in recent weeks, according to a fuel price survey. But that doesn't mean fuel retailers are suffering. Consider the case of Costco Wholesale Corp., which has some of the lowest gasoline prices around. The discount retailer this week reported big profits from fuel and other sales, as people make special trips to Costco for gas and then venture inside the stores.

Gas prices began rising around Labor Day and motorists have seen little relief since. Now, the Energy Department has boosted its pump-price predictions for the peak driving season, defined as April through September, and for the full year. Peak prices will average $3.925 for a gallon of regular gasoline in the peak driving season, 5.7% higher than during last year's peak season and up from February's forecast of $3.62 during the peak months, according to the agency's monthly Short-term Energy Outlook.

Just as in past gas spikes, the prices for used compact cars and hybrids are starting to rise quickly, according to auto information company Kelley Blue Book. While the average price of used fuel-efficient compacts at auction rose just a modest 0.4% in February, the values jumped 1.3% in the last week of the month. Hybrid prices rose by 3.6% in the last week, Kelley Blue Book said. “The 2010 Toyota Prius led in gains, increasing in value $1,370 through the month of February,” said Alec Gutierrez, an analyst at Kelley Blue Book.  “Dealers have been aggressively bidding on fuel-efficient vehicles at auction as consumer demand increases in response to rising gas prices.

From the day he entered the White House, the biggest threat to Barack Obama's chances of becoming a two-term president has been the battered state of the U.S. economy. There have been new signs of trouble this spring: slower job growth, higher gasoline prices and fresh fears over the European debt crisis. Yet Obama's prospects on the economic front may be brighter than they now look. This past weekend brought encouraging signs that Europe is ready to take stronger action to confront its still-serious debt problems.

Sales of on-road motorcycles, which took a beating during the economic downturn, are finally revving up. According to the Motorcycle Industry Council, sales of new motorcycles meant for road use and scooters were up 8.8% for the first quarter of 2012 compared with the same period last year in part because of unseasonably warm weather and higher gas prices. Scooters alone got an especially big boost - 16.9% over last year. Sales of dual-purpose motorcycles, meant for on- and off-road riding, were up 12.7%.

The fifth straight week of gas price declines in Southern California has finally brought motorists back in range of what they were paying at the pump last year, according to the Automobile Club of Southern California's Weekend Gas Watch. The average cost of a gallon of regular gasoline in the Los Angeles-Long Beach area, for example, fell another four cents since last week to $4.228, the Automobile Club said. That was 15.7 cents a gallon lower than last month's price and just a penny a gallon higher than what motorists were paying last year.

WASHINGTON - The Republican-controlled House on Wednesday passed a transportation bill that would advance the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, defying a White House veto threat and stoking an election-year fight over what Congress can do about gas prices. The 293-127 vote to extend highway and transit funding through September sets up contentious negotiations with the Democratic-led Senate. The Senate rejected an effort to include the Canada-to-Texas pipeline project in its two-year $109-billion transportation bill.

WASHINGTON -- President Obama is proposing legislation to curb manipulation of oil markets that can drive up the price of gasoline.  Obama wants to boost funding for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to do more surveillance of the oil futures market and wants to increase the penalties for illegal market manipulation, including raising the maximum fine to $10 million from $1 million for violations. Obama plans to talk about the proposals at the White House on Tuesday morning.

Rich people are worried about the economy too. Four of five wealthy investors cite the economy's persistent weakness as their primary financial concern, up from seven in 10 people a year ago, according to a new survey.  Despite the improvement in the economy over the last 12 months, the well-to-do are nervous about everything from the nation's high unemployment rate to rising gas prices, according to the poll by Spectrem Group. What's it take to be considered wealthy?

Amid otherwise hopeful signs about the economy, the GOP presidential contenders are increasingly pointing to rising gas prices to criticize the president. Rick Santorum has recently taken to blaming Obama's "radical environmental policies" for the increase. Newt Gingrich, meanwhile, is now airing a 30-minute infomercial in Super Tuesday states outlining his strategy to return prices to $2.50 a gallon. "We paid $1.13 on average during the four years that I was speaker. When Barack Obama became president, we paid $1.89 that week," he says in the advertisement.

President Obama spent Wednesday morning talking about fluctuating gas prices with auto workers in North Carolina as his campaign doubles down on its effort to frame Republicans as out of touch with problems of the middle class. Speaking to workers at the Daimler truck plant in Mt. Holly, Obama complained that Republicans in Congress haven't gotten behind his proposal to cut subsidies for big oil companies. And on the campaign trail, he said, other candidates aren't offering realistic solutions to reducing reliance on foreign oil. "We're not going to be able to drill our way out of the problem of high gas prices," Obama said.

Gasoline prices dropped around much of the nation for the second straight week, an Energy Department survey showed. But don't get too excited. History suggests that prices will rise at least a few more times in the next few weeks, analysts said. Fuel prices have peaked before mid-May just once in the last 20 years, according to Energy Department statistics, and it hasn't happened since 1998. The Energy Department's latest survey, conducted Monday, found that the national average for a gallon of regular gasoline fell 1.7 cents to $3.922 since the previous Monday.

 Gasoline prices are dropping for the second straight week, but don't get too excited. Fuel prices have peaked before mid-May just once in the past 20 years, according to Energy Department statistics, and it hasn't happened since 1998. History suggests that the national average won't peak before mid-May at the earliest. The national average for a gallon of regular gasoline fell to $3.907, down another 2 cents since last week, according to the AAA Fuel Gauge Report. Fuel prices first began to fall in California about a month ago, although the decline has been slow.