Rio De Janeiro — Brazilian state-run oil firm Petrobras said it will reduce gasoline prices to distributors from Tuesday, marking the first price cut for the fuel since October 2023.
Gasoline prices will go down by 5.6% to an average 2.85 reais ($0.5005)/litre, a 0.17 reais cut per litre, Petrobras said in a statement on Monday.
The reduction comes after gasoline sales by distributors in Brazil rose 4.6% in April from a year earlier, reaching 3.81 billion litres, according to data from the regulator ANP.
In the year-to-date through April, gasoline sales totalled 14.74 billion litres, an increase of 3.5% compared to the same period in 2024. Sales declined last year compared to 2023.
Since 2023, Petrobras has enacted a new pricing policy that aims to avoid passing international volatility on to the domestic market.
The firm’s last adjustment was in July 2024, when Petrobras raised gasoline prices by 7%.
However, Petrobras’s price cut will not immediately be felt by end consumers at gas stations as it will depend on factors such as tax collection, anhydrous ethanol blending and profit margins in distribution and retail.
($1 = 5.6939 reais)
Reporting by Marta Nogueira; Writing by Isabel Teles; Editing by Aida Pelaez-Fernandez and Susan Fenton – Reuters
