Hollande's petrol price reduction a farce

The French government and the oil industry agreed on Friday to lower the price of petrol by up to six cents for a preliminary three-month period. The decision is a farce, writes the liberal business paper Les Echos: "The government pretends to be keeping its electoral promise to freeze fuel prices. On a planet where the quantity of petrol is irrevocably doomed to diminish, this is a fatal illusion. ... The sellers, for their part, pretend to play the game by selling the fuel at cost price. Some of them were already not far from that. But they will recoup their money elsewhere with disastrous repercussions, because a seller who sells at cost price very quickly goes bankrupt. The oil producers, in turn, will pretend to lower their margins by acquiring fuel from other sources, which won't do anything to slow down refinery closures. And everyone will pretend to slap each other on the back for a perfectly well-balanced agreement. ... What remains to be seen is whether consumers will pretend to be delighted."

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