Economy 18 December 2023, 11:12am

Fuel prices remain the same this Wednesday

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From Wednesday, domestic fuel prices will remain unchanged, holtankoljak.hu reports. We are already well below the psychologically important HUF 600 per litre price for both domestic refined oil products, but this could easily change in January due to the excise tax increase.

Domestic fuel prices will remain unchanged from Wednesday, with wholesale petrol and diesel prices unchanged mid-week. Average prices on Wednesday are as follows:

95-octane petrol: HUF 558/litre
Diesel: HUF 583/litre

Compared to their mid-May lows, the price of petrol will be just 0.5% or HUF 3 per litre higher and the price of diesel will be up 7.6% or HUF 41.

However, compared to their respective peaks on 20 September, we see a 15.7% drop (HUF 104) in the price of petrol and a 15.0% (HUF 103) reduction in the price of diesel.

At the beginning of January there will be a sharp break in the basically downward trend in domestic fuel prices: the forint has weakened so much against the euro in recent years that the excise tax rate on domestic fuels has fallen below the EU minimum level, so it was necessary to increase the tax to avoid infringement proceedings.

The new tax level, which the government is "over-securing" itself with, will come into effect from 1 January, when

the price of petrol and diesel will increase by HUF 41.3 per litre, including VAT.

Here are Hungarian fuel prices as of 13 December in regional comparison. Note that these are average prices taken from European databases, with the HUF values calculated at an EUR/HUF exchange rate of 380.4. If you add the impact of the excise tax hike, you'll find that Hungary's petrol would be the highest in the region, and the average price of diesel would be higher only in Austria and Serbia.