The Romanian fuel market is free, competition is significant and each company independently determines the price, said Adrian Nicolaescu, chairman of OMV Petrom Marketing board.

“There is significant competition in Romania, and oil companies or private stations (independent gas stations – e.n.) independently establish their fuel prices,” Nicolaescu said.

At the same time, asked whether it is true that when OMV Petrom modifies the price, the other companies align themselves to that price, he replied: “The Romanian market is a free market, each operator builds its price and transmits its price to its stations. I cannot say about other competitors with what speed they are aligning or whether they align with the prices made by OMV Petrom or others. I do not think that this is a way that others build their price,” he said.

The journalists also asked Nicolaescu what did Petrom learn from the 10-year-old lesson, when large gasoline chains were fined with record-breaking summs for cartel-type agreements, according to Agerpres.

“I think that Romania has learned a lot at that moment from that lesson. Now it’s not the case. From that moment until today, from a legal perspective, the market has grown so much, that’s what I want to tell you and I think in all sectors of activity, not only in the oil field, the maturing and transparency of the Romanian markets for consumers was very much seen,” said OMV Petrom’s leader.

“We, OMV Petrom, are in the EU average, we have always been these years in the EU or below average (pricing). The difference you see between countries is very small, up to one eurocent. Of course there are many reasons, namely: on the legislation side, Romania is a country with mandatory stocks that each operator has to keep. It is one of the few EU countries that keeps these stocks through companies, compared to the external model where there are storage entities. In Romania, this cost is supported by companies and further transposed to the market. On the other hand, there is a component of a bio product that has a certain weight and involves a cost which the market further supports. Romania is the leader in the percentage of bio components,” added the OMV Petrom official.