You are actually completely correct about what oil is being sold at a particular time.
The oil commodity contracts are still in three month time limits I believe.
Retail gas stations paid already for gas three months or maybe more ago. So, if they paid wholesale including volume discounts in November at prices of 2.25 gal, January prices of 2.95 would have been normal. The forever false line about thin fuel margins are IMO bullshit and I've seen the books of gas stations I've worked. Prices are always 2 or 3 months out, and of course always higher. The line is they make money on stuff they sell. That was never a factor until the 70's and 80's when stations went self serve with only one employee and selling cigs. That whole premise didn't really exist before then. Product sales were just gravy. The only time I've ever seen a gas station close is when the owner got caught manipulating the pumps and embezzling from his own station.
But I do see almost every station enlarging at their locations.
During 2020 the stations still weren't hurting until lowering prices caught them late in the year. Everyone was selling cheaper glut holdings all year. There was no shortage of oil, the manufacturers just shut stuff down and kept using what was built up. All the oil companies posted record profits the whole time of the pandemic. They don't even like announcing that stuff on tv any more. The oil companies liked to brag.
There's so much that opec and US kept production shut off still.
And the end user pays the price. It's 4 bucks a gal here, 40% higher in a week. Yet nothing around here has changed. and the high price is on oil they paid 1.90 or so 3 months ago.
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