US gasoline demand at lowest level in 3 years-MasterCard

NEW YORK, April 8 (Reuters) - U.S. retail gasoline demand sank to its lowest level since April 2005 as the average retail price of the motor fuel jumped to a new high, MasterCard Advisors said Tuesday.

Motorists pumped an average of 9.043 million barrels per day in the week ended April 7. That was 2.5 percent lower than demand in the previous week and 6.8 percent below year-ago levels, according to MasterCard's weekly SpendingPulse report.

"Part of this year-on-year decline was in fact due to pre-holiday pumping in 2007," said Michael McNamara, vice president of MasterCard Advisors.

Easter fell on April 8 in 2007, a few weeks later than it did in 2008.

"But the other half of the story was a lack of the typical seasonal lift in pumping in 2008. This is unusual for the month of April where we typically see seasonal increases in week-to-week demand," McNamara said.

The national average price of gasoline climbed 3 cents to $3.30 per gallon, up about 22 percent from the same time last year and the highest recorded by the MasterCard report.

The 4-week average U.S. gasoline consumption rate dropped 1.2 percent to 9.201 million bpd, according to the report.

Meanwhile, a Reuters poll of energy analysts called for domestic gasoline stocks to have fallen for the fourth week in a row when the U.S. Energy Information Administration releases its report on nationwide fuel inventories on Wednesday.

Analysts said economic run cuts, planned maintenance and unplanned outages have cut into gasoline stocks by keeping refinery utilization rates from increasing. On average they forecast a drop of 2.5 million barrels.

MasterCard Advisors estimates retail gasoline demand based on aggregate sales activity in the MasterCard payments system coupled with estimates for all other payment forms. MasterCard Advisors is a unit of MasterCard Inc (MA.N: Quote, Profile, Research). (Reporting by Rebekah Kebede; Editing by John Picinich)