Gas and oil prices show signs of settling, AAA says

Gas prices dropped a couple of pennies last week after a weeks-long holiday season run-up, travel club AAA reported.

The average per-gallon price in Florida on Tuesday was $2.38, down 2 cents from $2.40 a week earlier.

How long the reprieve lasts remains to be seen.

“Gas prices are beginning to follow that downward trend we are used to seeing in January, as gasoline demand typically hits its lowest point of the year,” AAA spokesman Mark Jenkins said.

The decline has been so small that motorists may not have noticed, but that might change, AAA said in a news release.

“It’s possible prices could slip another 5-10 cents by the end of the month, but continued volatility in the price of oil could play spoiler.”

Gas prices in Florida fell to $2.09 a gallon — and under $2 at hundreds of gas stations in the central and northern parts of the state — on the Sunday after Thanksgiving. Then oil-producing nations met and announced plans to cut production by 1.8 million barrels a day for six months after the New Year. That triggered crude’s rapid price rise to more than $50 a barrel from the mid-$30s a year ago and gasoline to $2.41 in Florida during the first week of January.

Average gasoline prices in South Florida ranged from $2.44 in Broward County to $2.45 in Miami-Dade County and $2.49 in Palm Beach County. Higher local taxes in the tricounty region tend to keep pump prices higher than the state average.

Competition often produces bargain clusters that show up in various areas.