The recovery in US gasoline consumption has plateaued as the summer driving season comes to an end and the school year begins for wide swaths of the country. Latest data by OPIS, an IHS Markit company, shows that demand actually fell 1.9% during the last full week of August from the previous week. The four-week rolling average for the period ending 29 August now shows demand resting at 18.2% below prior year levels. US gasoline sales had improved rapidly from May to early July following the collapse in early April that came with the national shutdown, when sales were 50% below prior year levels. But the recovery had begun to sputter even before demand slipped backwards in that final week of August. The most recent OPIS survey now suggests that the post-COVID peak for US volumes occurred during the week ending 15 August at 7.844 million barrels per day—15.4% […]