Entrepreneurs lug cheap Mexican fuel across border

TIJUANA, Mexico (Reuters) – U.S. and Mexican entrepreneurs with an eye for a quick buck are buying subsidized fuel in bulk in Mexico and hauling it across the U.S. border to make big profits, officials say.

With a yawning gap between the cost of Mexico’s state-subsidized fuel and record U.S. pump prices, tanker truck owners and people doing business on the border are filling up tanks or plastic barrels with Mexican fuel and selling it in the United States.

Gasoline in Mexico is around a third cheaper than in the United States. For diesel, prices are more than double — well over $4 a gallon in U.S. border states compared to just over $2 in Mexican border cities.

“It is true tanker trucks are coming from the United States to fill up with supplies in Mexico,” Mario Osuna, the head of Mexico’s consumer watchdog agency Profeco in Baja California state where Tijuana is the capital, said on Thursday.

Reuters