{"id":840238,"date":"2025-10-17T11:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-10-17T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=840238"},"modified":"2025-10-17T10:56:16","modified_gmt":"2025-10-17T08:56:16","slug":"a-win-for-petrol-prices-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/energy\/840238\/a-win-for-petrol-prices-in-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"A win for petrol prices in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Global oil prices are heading for their biggest losing streak since March, pulling towards $60 a barrel and boosting local fuel price recoveries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is feeding through and building towards petrol and diesel price cuts in November, and making up for a slight weakening in the rand\/dollar exchange rate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Bloomberg’s analysis of the market, the main driving force behind oil’s decline is the simmering tensions between the United States and China, with another trade war looming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Markets are keeping an eye on rising trade tensions between China and the US that could hurt global economic growth and energy demand in the world’s two biggest crude consumers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite a temporary truce declared in the US-China trade war earlier this year, China has moved to tighten controls on rare-earth minerals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These are critical for advanced manufacturing in sectors such as technology, automotive, and defence, and the United States is not happy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, China blames the US for the rising tensions, saying that its economic and trade responses come after the Trump administration introduced a series of restrictive measures following meetings in Madrid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the world’s biggest economies play the blame game with each other, oil markets have started factoring in the impact, with a renewed trade war likely to crush demand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This also comes as global oil production ramps up, with industry bodies anticipating a significant oversupply of about 20% in 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With high supply and low demand on the cards, oil prices have lost 3% this week, and almost 20% since January.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is leading to a 16-cent to 50-cent per litre over-recovery in local pricing\u2014a significant swing from September.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Adding to the good news for motorists, market analysts expect the declines to continue, with some even projecting a drop well below $60 a barrel, which should feed into more over-recoveries in the months ahead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Petrol prices building for a cut<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Given the drop in oil, petrol prices in South Africa are expected to fall by 58 to 61 cents per litre in November 2025, also boosted by the resilient rand\/dollar exchange rate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Diesel is building for a smaller cut at around 29 cents per litre, but this has been trending upward since the start of the month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Expected changes (mid-month estimates):<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n
  • Petrol 93:<\/strong> decrease<\/mark> of 61 cents per litre<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Petrol 95:<\/strong> decrease<\/mark> of 58 cents per litre<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Diesel 0.05% (wholesale):<\/strong>\u00a0decrease<\/mark> of 29 cents per litre<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Diesel 0.005% (wholesale):<\/strong>\u00a0decrease<\/mark> of 29 cents per litre<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Illuminating paraffin:\u00a0<\/strong>decrease<\/mark> of 14 cents per litre<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

    As South Africa is an importer of oil, and trades are done in dollars, the oil price and local rand\/dollar exchange are fundamental components of determining the cost to motorists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Despite weakening against the dollar this week\u2014as investors gravitate toward safer assets amid uncertainty, like the looming US-China trade war\u2014the rand remains stronger, relative to September.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Looking ahead, analysts have noted that with gold and platinum prices surging higher and South Africa’s terms of trade as strong as ever, there is a high probability that the rand will regain its footing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    This means trading stronger in the coming weeks, or even attempting another push to cross the R17.00\/$ level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    However, the outlook is not without its risks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    As has been seen this week, the rand has the potential to weaken rapidly, mostly taking direction from global markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    The unit has been trading in a wider range in October, between R17.07 and R17.50\/$, swinging on global risk sentiment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    As geopolitical tensions rise, speculation about US rate cuts plays out, and the prolonged US government shutdown continues, the rand may just as likely find itself on the back foot.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Global oil prices are heading for their biggest losing streak since March, pulling towards $60 a barrel and boosting local fuel price recoveries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":714644,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9874],"tags":[19909,18450,2171],"class_list":["post-840238","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","tag-diesel-price","tag-oil-price","tag-petrol-price"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840238","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=840238"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840238\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":840244,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840238\/revisions\/840244"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/714644"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=840238"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=840238"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=840238"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}