It's an interesting dynamic. Sellers don't want to increase prices, perhaps in fear of upsetting customers / Trump, and so we've got this long delay where they seem to hope Trump wakes up on the right side of the bed tomorrow and changes his mind ...
I would expect prices to be more dynamic but there seems to have been a wait it out approach so far.
RiverCrochet · 9m ago
Supply decreases when prices can't go up, but need to.
I saw this in my area of the U.S. a few years ago when severe weather events created issues with refineries for a few days, and it impacted gas deliveries to gas stations.
It seemed like gas stations preferred to run out of gas at the pumps instead of raising the prices and be accused of gouging.
Fortunately these were very temporary situations, and it seemed they've been mitigated now I think by temporarily removing limits on tanker truck driver hours when those situations occur.
I would expect prices to be more dynamic but there seems to have been a wait it out approach so far.
I saw this in my area of the U.S. a few years ago when severe weather events created issues with refineries for a few days, and it impacted gas deliveries to gas stations.
It seemed like gas stations preferred to run out of gas at the pumps instead of raising the prices and be accused of gouging.
Fortunately these were very temporary situations, and it seemed they've been mitigated now I think by temporarily removing limits on tanker truck driver hours when those situations occur.