AAA Daily Fuel Gauge Report for Friday, 3/15/24

National Average Price for Regular Unleaded Current: $3.537; Month Ago: $3.319; Year Ago: $3.461. National Average Price for Diesel Current: $4.042; Month Ago: $4.069; Year Ago: $4.240.

Six companies bought 14 million barrels of oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve in a sale required by law to help fund medical research and the federal government, said the Department of Energy on Thursday. BP Oil Supply, Exxon Mobil Corp, Phillips 66, Shell Trading, Valero Marketing and Supply Company, and Macquarie Commodities Trading bought oil from the reserve, which is held in salt caverns on the Texas and Louisiana coasts. The companies bought the oil at a range from $46.98 to $47.91 a barrel, slightly below the current futures price of about $49.70 per barrel, depending on which location the crude came from and whether it was sent by pipeline or directly to vessels, which could export the petroleum.

American Trucking Associations’ advanced seasonally adjusted (SA) For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index increased 2.7% in June after rising 0.3% in May. In June, the index equaled 120.1 (2015=100) versus 116.9 in May. “June’s jump tells me a couple of things: first, the transition in the freight market from spot back to contract continues. ATA’s tonnage index is dominated by contract freight, so while the spot market has slowed as freight softens, contract carriers are backfilling those losses with loads from shippers reducing spot market exposure," said ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello. "Essentially, the market is transitioning back to pre-pandemic shares of contract versus spot market. “Second, and perhaps equally important, while economic growth is expected to be soft overall in the second quarter, the goods-economy wasn’t as bad as feared," he said. May’s increase was revised down from our June 21 press release.