New calculations by the Munich IFO Institute indicate that while the state fuel discount largely benefited drivers, its effect was not complete. According to the findings, prices in Germany were approximately 17 cents lower for Super E5, 16 cents lower for Super E10, and 12 cents lower for diesel when compared to benchmark prices at foreign stations without the discount. This confirms that the fuel discount for regular gasoline was almost entirely passed on to consumers. However, for diesel, the distribution of the discount only reached around 73 percent, noted Florian Neumeier, Deputy Head of the IFO Center for Financial Sciences. He added that without the discount, the average price for a liter of regular gasoline would likely have exceeded €2 throughout June.
The expiration of the fuel discount on June 30th is also expected by the IFO expert to lead to rising fuel prices beginning in July. Ramona Schmid, a research assistant at the IFO Center for Financial Sciences, stated that the extent of the increase will depend primarily on global oil price trends. She noted that while fuel prices have recently eased due to falling oil costs, they are subject to this external development.
The IFO researchers agree with the federal government’s decision to allow the discount to expire. Christian Gréus of the IFO Center for Financial Sciences emphasized that the measure was costly, having incurred approximately €1.6 billion for the state. He pointed out that the incomplete passing on of the savings from the diesel discount meant that a portion of the benefit remained with the mineral oil corporations. Furthermore, should an agreement be successfully reached between the United States and Iran, fuel prices are predicted to normalize regardless.
