Oil minister M Veerappa Moily on Monday ruled out a rollback in the Rs.1.50-a-litre hike in petrol and 45 paise a litre increase in diesel rates, saying only a small raise has been passed on to consumers.

“I think everybody would appreciate that we have not put a lot of burden on consumers. It is only small doses,” Moily told reporters. “Our country imports 73-75% of oil. We need to pay R7 lakh crore for the imports. Where do we find that kind of money?” he said.

The Competition Commission of India (CCI) is issuing a notice to three state-owned oil marketing companies (OMCs) on a probe on whether they form a cartel to fix petrol prices.

The commission is also looking at the coal and fertiliser sectors, where government-owned companies dominate the market. “Law does not distinguish between government and private companies,” said Ashok Chawla, chairman of CCI, addressing the annual global investor conference here of Kotak Institutional Equities. “After the government clarified that it does not have a role to play in petrol pricing after deregulation, we have taken up the issue.”

ONGC, BPCL soon to sign an MoU for putting up LNG terminal at Mangalore

ONGC, Six years after the $1 billion project was put in cold storage, state-owned Oil & Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) will by this month-end revive plans to set up a liquid gas (LNG) import terminal near its Mangalore refinery in Karnataka. “In next 10 to 15 days, ONGC and Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) will sign an MoU for putting up a LNG terminal at Mangalore,” Oil Minister M Veerappa Moily announced at the inauguration of state gas utility GAIL India Ltd’s Dabhol-Bangalore gas pipeline.

Indian Oil Corporation review meeting later this week

The next phase of rise in diesel prices seems, unlike earlier, to be a non-combined exercise from the three government oil marketing companies ( OMCs). On January 17, the government allowed Indian Oil Corporation ( IOC), Hindustan Petroleum Corporation (HPC) and Bharat Petroleum Corporation (BPC) to eliminate the loss on sale of diesel to bulk consumers at one go and do a gradual rise in prices at monthly intervals for retail outlets — the government had suggested a 45-50p/litre rise at a time. A month gets over this Sunday, since the decision

Assam-based Numaligarh Refinery Ltd (NRL), which has a massive expansion plan of its refinery on the cards, is eyeing the Bangladesh market to sell products in near future.

A senior company spokesperson confirmed Business Standard that NRL was exploring the neighbouring country’s market and business discussions with Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) and the government of Bangladesh for supplying diesel were on. “Both BPC and government of Bangladesh have expressed keen interest in the project and desired that this project be pursued expeditiously,” the spokesperson added. NRL and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL), NRL’s parent company, had “detailed discussion” with BPC and Bangladesh government representatives in the month of January 2013 to “progress on this proposal”.

The government will pay Rs 25,000 crore additional cash subsidy to state-owned fuel retailers to make up for part of the revenue they lost on selling auto and cooking fuel below cost this fiscal.

The Finance Ministry on February 7 issued a "comfort letter" to Indian Oil Corp (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corp (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corp (HPCL) sanctioning Rs 25,000 crore for part of the revenue they lost on selling diesel,

New Delhi: Fearing oil refineries will be hit hard by the Finance Ministry's move to change the way petrol and diesel are priced, Oil Minister M Veerappa Moily has asked Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to constitute an expert committee to decide on the issue.

The Finance Ministry has informed the Petroleum Ministry that auto fuel needs to be priced at export parity rather than import parity as the 2.5 per cent customs duty was adding to the under-recoveries of the state-run oil marketing companies without contributing any revenue to the exchequer.

With an eye on bigger imports, the oil marketing firm may get its French partner Total to set it up

State-run oil marketing firm Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL) is planning to invest Rs 600-700 crore to set up its second underground liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) storage facility in Mangalore. The company could rope in its partner, Total SA of France, to build the cavern. "Given the demand for LPG, we think importing in large quantity would make more sense than importing in smaller capacity. We are discussing the feasibility of this project and would decide on the same in the next six months," said a senior HPCL official, requesting anonymity.

The government’s decision to cap the number of subsidised LPG (liquefied natural gas) cylinders seems to have brought cheer to oil companies as their auto gas segment has registered significant growth since last September.

IndianOil Corp Ltd, for instance, saw a growth of around 22 per cent in volumes and nearly two per cent in its market share. It traded nearly 10,517 million tonnes (mt) of auto gas in December against 8,593 mt of auto gas in September.

Their first target could be bulk buyers but state-owned companies are well-entrenched in that market

At 65 million tonnes per annum, diesel accounts for nearly 40 per cent of all petroleum products sold in the country. Not surprisingly, it is a huge opportunity for private oil marketing companies. Now that the government has decided to decontrol diesel prices for bulk users and allowed government-controlled oil marketing companies to raise retail prices in small monthly doses, private oil companies such as Reliance Industries, Essar Oil and Shell India have a real opportunity on their hands.