I try to explain this to people all the time with respect to gasoline prices in the US.
People thing it has to do with the 'oil companies', but crude producers are hedged into next decade for the most part. Even on the refinery side they are locked in long term contracts with distributors for their products, of which gasoline is a very small piece of the pie.
I listened to a Planet Money podcast [0] last month that was really interesting and helpful (for me at least) to understand the aggregate price breakdown and the different aspects which contribute to the sum (e.g. transport, refinement, drilling, taxes, etc ...) price for a unit of gasoline.
In particular, one portion talks about how tankers aren't beholden to the original manifest when they leave port A to go to port B. Mid voyage, they can suddenly pivot to port C if the spot buying price there is better than port B. And so on and so forth. So, until the tanker reaches a particular port - the market is what dictates which ports the tankers end up gravitating towards dynamically (and probably factoring in current and future weather, spot buying price fluctuations, current proximity, piracy, etc.) Really fascinating stuff and was eye opening for me to realize how truly small the transport cost portion is for the cost of a unit of gasoline.
"Planet Money investigates how exactly gas stations determine how much a gallon is going to cost us, and why those numbers are so volatile."
People thing it has to do with the 'oil companies', but crude producers are hedged into next decade for the most part. Even on the refinery side they are locked in long term contracts with distributors for their products, of which gasoline is a very small piece of the pie.