Gasoline Price

California gasoline prices may have already peaked for the first half of the year and should head lower soon, analysts said. Meanwhile, nationwide gasoline price averages over the first two months of the year rose at such a blistering rate that Americans were on pace to pay half a trillion dollars on gasoline in 2013 for the first time ever, analysts said. The high prices were causing big changes in the driving habits of American motorists, with gasoline consumption dropping sharply.

Southern California has seen its biggest ever one-month rise in gasoline prices, according to the Automobile Club of Southern California's weekend gas watch. The average price for a gallon of regular gasoline in the varying regions of Southern California has now climbed 57 to 59 cents since last month. "We looked at all of the one-month spikes that could have been bigger since the year 2000 and this was bigger than any of those," said Marie Montgomery, a spokeswoman for the Automobile Club.

Supporters of green-car technology like hybrids, plug-in hybrids and electric cars say they were happy to hear that automakers like Ford and Honda are expanding the number of dealerships who can sell those cars. Honda's 2013 Honda Fit EV, launched in California and Oregon in July, will be added to dealerships in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maryland, New York and New Jersey. Ford Motor Co. is accelerating dealership certification for its plug-in electrified vehicles from 200 to 900 dealers.

Went to a magic show Sunday, called, appropriately enough, “ Smoke and Mirrors .” Watched the magician pull a rabbit out of his hat and everything. (OK, it was a bird, but who's counting?) You know it's all an illusion -- trickery, sleight of hand, misdirection -- but you laugh and are amazed anyway.  Great fun. Came to work Monday and read about a different magic show. It's called gas prices, though it could just as easily be called smoke and mirrors. Seems that gasoline prices are at record highs for this time of year, both nationally and in California.

Hedge funds, commodity pools and other high-roller investors have thrown close to $12.5 billion into a collective bet that gasoline prices will rise, and some analysts say it's one reason why gasoline prices are at a record for this date in California and nationally. The details were contained in the Commodity Futures Trading Commission report released Friday, showing that betting on higher gasoline prices was closing in on the highest level ever of $13 billion, set last March. Quiz: Why are California gas prices so high?

Average California gasoline prices jumped 23 cents in the last week, passing $4 a gallon in Los Angeles, fuel surveys show. This surge follows a year in which the nation's motorists spent a greater percentage of their annual income on gasoline than at any time in the last three decades, the Energy Department said. Gasoline expenditures were higher despite a sharp improvement in automobile fuel economy, according to a separate report. The average cost for a gallon of regular gasoline in California jumped to $3.914 on Monday, up 23.4 cents from a week earlier, according to the AAA Fuel Gauge Report.

Expect a bit of a shock if you fill up your gas tanks in Southern California this week. The average price of a gallon of regular gasoline in the state has jumped 23.4 cents since last Monday, according to the AAA Fuel Gauge Report. Most of the spike has been driven by the state's southern counties. PHOTOS: Best car values for fuel economy Los Angeles and Long Beach, for example, are averaging $4.017 a gallon, up 24.8 cents over the past week. Orange County gasoline is averaging $4.002 a gallon, up 26.1 cents since last Monday.

It's the kind of news that Americans waiting for holiday spending bills to arrive don't want to hear: “Even with increasing energy production in the U.S., declining fuel consumption, and improving fuel efficiency, Americans may still face rising gasoline prices in 2013. " The quote comes from Gregg Laskoski, one of the senior petroleum analysts at GasBuddy.com. That's the fuel price spotting service used by several million smartphone users to report the highest and lowest gasoline and diesel prices they encounter.

Record gasoline prices in 2012 and calls for investigation of California's fuel markets have brought into focus a persistent peculiarity of the state's service station world: the wild swings in price any brand has from one location to the next. Known in the industry as zone pricing, the controversial practice was apparent one afternoon when Culver City resident Michael Denis, on a jaunt to downtown Los Angeles, stopped at a Chevron station to feed his Fiat 500 some gasoline at $4.69 a gallon.

Californians had the worst year imaginable for gasoline prices in 2012, averaging a record $4.028 for a gallon of regular, according to the AAA Fuel Gauge Report. That shattered the old record, set last year, by a whopping 21.3 cents a gallon. The jump was so big that it even surprised people who review fuel prices on a daily basis. "I can remember when the California average for the year in 2008 was $3.525 and we thought we would never see it go that high again," said Marie Montgomery, spokeswoman for the Automobile Club of Southern California.