Fuel prices not falling fast enough in Russia - FAS chief
NOVO-OGAREVO. Feb 17 (Interfax) - Fuel prices are not falling fast enough in Russia, Igor Artemiyev, head of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS), said at a meeting of the government's presidium.
"If you talk about the rates at which retail prices are falling at the filling stations of the major vertically integrated oil companies, then the average drop is not two but one ruble, or half," he said.
Wholesale prices have fallen around 2,000 rubles, he said.
"But we think it should be twice that," he said.
He said that antimonopoly investigations have been started in around a dozen Russian region where price increases have indicated monopolistic positioning. "I think that oil companies should think deeply over the coming week. I think that there still is a week to wait since there probably won't be a shock because independent retail operations would suffer," Artemiyev said.
This primarily concerns the cost of diesel fuel, he said. "A completely unacceptable [price] ratio is still continuing today in many regions," he said.
Artemiyev expressed the position that following antimonopoly efforts prices should return to where they were in October-November 2010. "Again I want to emphasize that this trend is there but it is absolutely unacceptable in relation to those goals and tasks to which companies themselves have agreed," he added.