The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China's top economic planner, on Wednesday announced the first fuel price cut in 2016. The announcement, available on its official website, show that domestic benchmark gasoline price will be cut by 140 yuan per metric ton (tonne), while diesel price is to see a price dip of 135 yuan per tonne, starting from mid-night Wednesday.
The NDRC also rolled out new oil pricing rules in another statement posted to its website at the same time. According to Xinhua's calculation, the moving average of the basket of crude oil prices, to which China's product oil prices are pegged,dropped 6.04 percent as of Jan. 12 from the latest cycle of fuel prices adjustment, according to the old pricing mechanism.
But Wednesday's adjustment might not follow the old rules, neither the new one. Under the old mechanism, benchmark prices of gasoline and diesel will be adjusted every 10 working days except when the adjustment is less than 50 yuan/tonne. The unrealized change would be counted into the following cycle of price adjustment.
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