Energy Markets: Mergers and Many Other Factors Affect U.S. Gasoline Markets
Released: 2004-07-07T00:00:00

Letter

Background

Many firms of varying sizes make up the U.S. petroleum industry. While some firms engage in only limited activities within the industry, such as exploration for and production of crude oil and natural gas or refining crude oil and marketing petroleum products, fully vertically integrated oil companies participate in all aspects of the industry. Before the 1970s, major oil companies that were fully vertically integrated controlled the global network for supplying, pricing, and marketing crude oil. However, the structure of the world crude oil market has dramatically changed as a result of such factors as the nationalization of oil fields by oil-producing countries, the emergence of independent oil companies, and the evolution of futures and spot markets in the 1970s and 1980s. Since U.S. oil prices were deregulated in 1981, the price paid for crude oil in the United States has been largely determined in the world oil market, which is mostly influenced by global factors, especially supply decisions of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and world economic and political conditions.

The United States currently imports over 60 percent of its crude oil supply. In contrast, the bulk of the gasoline used in the United States is produced domestically. In 2001, for example, gasoline refined in the United States accounted for over 90 percent of the total domestic gasoline consumption. Companies that supply gasoline to U.S. markets also post the domestic gasoline prices. Historically, the domestic petroleum market has been divided into five regions: the East Coast region, the Midwest region, the Gulf Coast region, the Rocky Mountain region, and the West Coast region.

Proposed mergers in all industries, including the petroleum industry, are generally reviewed by federal antitrust authorities—including FTC and the Department of Justice (DOJ)—to assess the potential impact on market competition. According to FTC officials, FTC generally reviews proposed mergers involving the petroleum industry because of the agency’s expertise in that industry. FTC analyzes these mergers to determine if they would likely diminish competition in the relevant markets and result in harm, such as increased prices. To determine the potential effect of a merger on market competition, FTC evaluates how the merger would change the level of market concentration, among other things. Conceptually, the higher the concentration, the less competitive the market is and the more likely that firms can exert control over prices. The ability to maintain prices above competitive levels for a significant period of time is known as market power.

According to the merger guidelines jointly issued by DOJ and FTC, market concentration as measured by HHI is ranked into three separate categories: a market with an HHI under 1,000 is considered to be unconcentrated; if HHI is between 1,000 and 1,800 the market is considered moderately concentrated; and if HHI is above 1,800, the market is considered highly concentrated.

While concentration is an important aspect of market structure—the underlying economic and technical characteristics of an industry—other aspects of market structure that may be affected by mergers also play an important role in determining the level of competition in a market. These aspects include barriers to entry, which are market conditions that provide established sellers an advantage over potential new entrants in an industry, and vertical integration.

Mergers Occurred in All Segments of the U.S. Petroleum Industry in the 1990s for Several Reasons

Over 2,600 merger transactions occurred from 1991 through 2000 involving all three segments of the U.S. petroleum industry. Almost 85 percent of the mergers occurred in the upstream segment (exploration and production), while the downstream segment (refining and marketing of petroleum) accounted for about 13 percent, and the midstream segment (transportation) accounted for over 2 percent. The vast majority of the mergers—about 80 percent—involved one company’s purchase of a segment or asset of another company, while about 20 percent involved the acquisition of a company’s total assets by another so that the two became one company. Most of the mergers occurred in the second half of the decade, including those involving large partially or fully vertically integrated companies.

Petroleum industry officials and experts we contacted cited several reasons for the industry’s wave of mergers in the 1990s, including achieving synergies, increasing growth and diversifying assets, and reducing costs. Economic literature indicates that enhancing market power is also sometimes a motive for mergers. Ultimately, these reasons mostly relate to companies’ desire to maximize profit or stock values.

Mergers Contributed to Increases in Market Concentration and to Other Changes That Affect Competition

Mergers in the 1990s contributed to increases in market concentration in the downstream segment of the U.S. petroleum industry, while the upstream segment experienced little change overall. We found that market concentration, as measured by the HHI, decreased slightly in the upstream segment, based on crude oil production activities at the national level, from 290 in 1990 to 217 in 2000. Moreover, based on benchmarks established jointly by DOJ and FTC, the upstream segment of the U.S. petroleum industry remained unconcentrated at the end of the 1990s.

The increases in market concentration in the downstream segment varied by activity and region.

For example, the HHI of the refining market in the East Coast region increased from a moderately concentrated level of 1136 in 1990 to a highly concentrated level of 1819 in 2000. In the Rocky Mountain and the West Coast regions, it increased from 1029 to 1124 and from 937 to 1267, respectively, in that same period. Thus, while each of these refining markets increased in concentration, the Rocky Mountain remained within the moderately concentrated range but the West Coast changed from unconcentrated in 1990 to moderately concentrated in 2000. The HHI of refining markets also increased from 699 to 980 in the Midwest and from 534 to 704 in the Gulf Coast during the same period, although these markets remained unconcentrated.

In wholesale gasoline markets, market concentration increased broadly throughout the United States between 1994 and 2002. Specifically, we found that 46 states and the District of Columbia had moderately or highly concentrated markets by 2002, compared to 27 in 1994.

In both the refining and wholesale markets of the downstream segment, merger activity and market concentration were highly correlated for most regions of the country.

Evidence from various sources indicates that, in addition to increasing market concentration, mergers also contributed to changes in other aspects of market structure in the U.S. petroleum industry that affect competition—specifically, vertical integration and barriers to entry. However, we could not quantify the extent of these changes because of a lack of relevant data.

Vertical integration can conceptually have both pro- and anticompetitive effects. Based on anecdotal evidence and economic analyses by some industry experts, we determined that a number of mergers that have occurred since the 1990s have led to greater vertical integration in the U.S. petroleum industry, especially in the refining and marketing segment. For example, we identified eight mergers that occurred between 1995 and 2001 that might have enhanced the degree of vertical integration, particularly in the downstream segment.

Concerning barriers to entry, our interviews with petroleum industry officials and experts provide evidence that mergers had some impact on the U.S. petroleum industry. Barriers to entry could have implications for market competition because companies that operate in concentrated industries with high barriers to entry are more likely to possess market power. Industry officials pointed out that large capital requirements and environmental regulations constitute barriers for potential new entrants into the U.S. refining business. For example, the officials indicated that a typical refinery could cost billions of dollars to build and that it may be difficult to obtain the necessary permits from the relevant state or local authorities. At the wholesale and retail marketing levels, industry officials pointed out that mergers might have exacerbated barriers to entry in some markets. For example, the officials noted that mergers have contributed to a situation where pipelines and terminals are owned by fewer, mostly integrated companies that sometimes deny access to third-party users, especially when supply is tight—which creates a disincentive for potential new entrants into such wholesale markets.

U.S. Gasoline Marketing Has Changed in Two Major Ways

According to some petroleum industry officials that we interviewed, gasoline marketing in the United States has changed in two major ways since the 1990s. First, the availability of unbranded gasoline has decreased, partly due to mergers. Officials noted that unbranded gasoline is generally priced lower than branded. They generally attributed the decreased availability of unbranded gasoline to one or more of the following factors: There are now fewer independent refiners, who typically supply mostly unbranded gasoline. These refiners have been acquired by branded companies, have grown large enough to be considered a brand, or have simply closed down.

Partially or fully vertically integrated oil companies have sold or mothballed some refineries. As a result, some of these companies now have only enough refinery capacity to supply their own branded needs, with little or no excess to sell as unbranded.

Major branded refiners are managing their inventory more efficiently, ensuring that they produce only enough gasoline to meet their current branded needs.

We could not quantify the extent of the decrease in the unbranded gasoline supply because the data required for such analyses do not exist.

The second change identified by these officials is that refiners now prefer dealing with large distributors and retailers because they present a lower credit risk and because it is more efficient to sell a larger volume through fewer entities. Refiners manifest this preference by setting minimum volume requirements for gasoline purchases. These requirements have motivated further consolidation in the distributor and retail sectors, including the rise of hypermarkets.

Mergers and Increased Market Concentration Generally Led to Higher U.S. Wholesale Gasoline Prices

Our econometric modeling shows that the mergers we examined mostly led to higher wholesale gasoline prices in the second half of the 1990s. The majority of the eight specific mergers we examined—Ultramar Diamond Shamrock (UDS)-Total, Tosco-Unocal, Marathon-Ashland, Shell-Texaco I (Equilon), Shell-Texaco II (Motiva), BP-Amoco, Exxon-Mobil, and Marathon Ashland Petroleum (MAP)-UDS—resulted in higher prices of wholesale gasoline in the cities where the merging companies supplied gasoline before they merged. The effects of some of the mergers were inconclusive, especially for boutique fuels sold in the East Coast and Gulf Coast regions and in California.

For the seven mergers that we modeled for conventional gasoline, five led to increased prices, especially the MAP-UDS and Exxon-Mobil mergers, where the increases generally exceeded 2 cents per gallon, on average.

For the four mergers that we modeled for reformulated gasoline, two— Exxon-Mobil and Marathon-Ashland—led to increased prices of about 1 cent per gallon, on average. In contrast, the Shell-Texaco II (Motiva) merger led to price decreases of less than one-half cent per gallon, on average, for branded gasoline only.

For the two mergers—Tosco-Unocal and Shell-Texaco I (Equilon)—that we modeled for gasoline used in California, known as California Air Resources Board (CARB) gasoline, only the Tosco-Unocal merger led to price increases. The increases were for branded gasoline only and exceeded 6 cents per gallon, on average.

For market concentration, which captures the cumulative effects of mergers as well as other competitive factors, our econometric analysis shows that increased market concentration resulted in higher wholesale gasoline prices.

Prices for conventional (non-boutique) gasoline, the dominant type of gasoline sold nationwide from 1994 through 2000, increased by less than one-half cent per gallon, on average, for branded and unbranded gasoline. The increases were larger in the West than in the East—the increases were between one-half cent and one cent per gallon in the West, and about one- quarter cent in the East (for branded gasoline only), on average.

Price increases for boutique fuels sold in some parts of the East Coast and Gulf Coast regions and in California were larger compared to the increases for conventional gasoline. The wholesale prices increased by an average of about 1 cent per gallon for boutique fuel sold in the East Coast and Gulf Coast regions between 1995 and 2000, and by an average of over 7 cents per gallon in California between 1996 and 2000.

Our analysis shows that wholesale gasoline prices were also affected by other factors included in the econometric models—particularly, gasoline inventories relative to demand, refinery capacity utilization rates, and the supply disruptions that occurred in some parts of the Midwest and the West Coast. In particular, wholesale gasoline prices were about 1 cent per gallon higher, on average, when gasoline inventories were low relative to demand, typically in the summer driving months. Also, prices were higher by about an average of one-tenth to two-tenths of 1 cent per gallon when refinery capacity utilization rates increased by 1 percent. The prices of conventional gasoline were about 4 to 5 cents per gallon higher, on average, during the Midwest and West Coast supply disruptions. The increase in prices for CARB gasoline was about 4 to 7 cents per gallon, on average, during the West Coast supply disruptions.

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement. I would be happy to respond to any questions that you or other Members of the Subcommittee may have.

GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments

For further information about this testimony, please contact me at (202) 512-3841. Key contributors to this testimony included Godwin Agbara, Scott Farrow, John A. Karikari, and Cynthia Norris.

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