Finance Minister AMA Muhith yesterday hinted that fuel prices might be reduced within the next two weeks to take to consumers the benefits of falling oil prices on the global market.

“We are reviewing it. I have not yet decided on the matter. I will do that within the next two weeks,” he told reporters at the Secretariat in the capital.

The minister said he would sit with the energy ministry before taking any proposal for reduction of oil prices to the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs.

He made the comments after a meeting with Rakesh Mohan, executive director of the International Monetary Fund, and Desmond Swayne, UK minister of state for the Department for International Development (DFID).

The government has long resisted the call for cutting oil prices though petroleum prices have been on the decline on the international market for over a year.

US crude oil prices plunged below $40 a barrel on Friday for the first time since the 2007-2008 global financial crisis, amid increasing signs that the prices will slide further.

Brent crude, the international benchmark, fell to its lowest since March 2009, touching $45.10 a barrel.

However, the government is selling kerosene, diesel, octane and petrol at prices fixed in January 2013.

State-run Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation, the sole oil importer, is making a whopping profit of Tk 13 to Tk 36 a litre on petroleum products since January this year on the back of sliding global oil prices.

The World Bank recently called for introducing a system that makes automatic adjustment of oil prices in line with global market rates. It said the current macroeconomic conditions in Bangladesh and the low international oil prices provide a historic opportunity to deregulate domestic oil prices.