What BP’s latest results say about UK petrol prices this autumn
Key Points
- BP earned $29.60 on every barrel it refined in the second quarter of 2026, against $11.90 in the same quarter last year.
- Brent crude averaged $103.85 a barrel over the quarter, up from $67.88 a year earlier.
- UK average pump prices reached 159.9 pence a litre for petrol and 179.2 pence for diesel in the week commencing Monday 3 August.
- BP told investors refining margins should stay elevated and remain sensitive to Middle East supply conditions.
- The company expects to process less crude in the third quarter, at 1,300,000 to 1,360,000 barrels a day.
BP earned $29.60 on every barrel it put through its refineries in the second quarter of 2026, more than double the $11.90 it made a year earlier, and told investors on Tuesday (4 August) that those margins should stay elevated for the rest of the year.
That figure is BP’s refining indicator margin, the gap between what the company pays for crude oil and what the petrol, diesel and jet fuel it produces are worth.
It sits directly upstream of the wholesale price UK forecourts pay, and it has widened faster than the crude price itself. Brent crude averaged $103.85 a barrel across the quarter against $67.88 in the same period of 2025, an increase of just over 50%. The refining margin rose by nearly 150% over the same period.
Why the refining margin matters at the pump
Wholesale fuel costs are the largest movable component of a UK pump price, alongside crude oil, the pound-dollar exchange rate, distribution and retailer margin.
Fuel duty stays fixed at 52.95 pence a litre, with increases scheduled from January 2027, and VAT is charged at 20% on the total. When refining margins widen, the effect reaches drivers through the price retailers pay rather than through the crude price alone.
Pump prices have already moved upwards in response to the latest resumption of hostilities in Iran.
The UK average stood at 159.9 pence a litre for petrol and 179.2 pence for diesel in the week commencing Monday (3 August), up 3.76 pence and 5.22 pence respectively on the previous week, according to Department for Energy Security and Net Zero weekly road fuel prices.
Diesel peaked at 192.14 pence in mid-April and petrol at 158.78 pence in late May.
What BP expects for the rest of the year
BP guides to lower refinery output in the third quarter, at 1,300,000 to 1,360,000 barrels a day against 1,467,000 in the second, reflecting the completed sale of its Gelsenkirchen refinery in Germany and reduced maintenance work.
It expects refining margins to stay elevated but sensitive to the cost of supply, and says fuel margins in its retail business will remain sensitive to conditions and developments in the Middle East, along with any policy response.
The company puts a figure on the sensitivity. Every $1 a barrel movement in its refining margin changes its profit before interest and tax by roughly $450 million, a rule of thumb it revised down from $550 million after the Gelsenkirchen sale.
The scale of the swing shows in the accounts. BP’s underlying profit for the quarter, which strips out one-off items and the effect of oil price moves on stock it already holds, came in at $5.7 billion against $2.35 billion a year earlier. Its refining and trading arm alone contributed $3.18 billion, up from $477 million.
Chief Executive Meg O’Neill, in her first full quarter in the role, attributed weaker plant performance partly to planned maintenance and to the conflict in the Middle East.
Reported production fell to 2,201,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day from 2,339,000 in the previous quarter, and BP now expects full-year production of 2,180,000 to 2,270,000, citing continued regional disruption.
