Whether it is a blizzard in January, an extensive summer drought, or an unpredictable hurricane; weather has always been the kryptonite for gas prices. This summers drought caused an enormous spike in the price of corn, which has a trickle down effect on ethanol prices which goes into the production of gasoline. Hurricanes in the past have caused huge spikes in the prices at the pump (remember Isaac and Katrina?) mostly because of where they hit the hardest (the nations oil and gas hub is along the Gulf Coast where many hurricanes touch down). However, the huge storm we just weathered, Super Storm Sandy, seems to be having an adverse effect on gas prices. I've noticed around the Philadelphia/New Jersey areas where I am a resident, that even though these regions were hit the hardest, the price of gas has decreased substantially. It seems odd to me because one would think that with the lines that were formed at some of the pumps in the area following the destruction that gas prices would have sky-rocketed, but they have not. It seems to me that the demand for gasoline at this time has decreased substantially because of this storm.

 The company I work for, which is a chemical distributor with our own fleet of trucks for delivery, took our fleet off the roads during the days of the storm, as well as a couple days following the storm. We also had our outside sales representatives off of the road for safety reasons. I know many of our customers in the damaged areas were unable to mobilize at all; some for a couple days and other for a couple weeks because of the storm. People in NYC weren't using their cars in the days following, and flying seemed to be the last thing on anybodies mind. The demand went down significantly because the Northeast is a gasoline consumer more than it is a producer. The drop in demand was much greater than the drop in supplies, which is the opposite for what happened in past hurricanes.

It's hard to say how this storm will end up affecting a companies financials without seeing every detail, but for the time being, with the lower gas prices, as well as lower oil prices, business costs such as heating and transportation will continue to be decreased. As companies begin running at full capacity again, which many in the New York/New Jersey area still have yet to do, they will benefit greatly from the cost of fuel being lower. I'm not saying that Super Storm Sandy's destruction was a good thing for this area, but it seems like gas prices have finally caught a break in terms of surviving the weather.