Chief Prognosticator

Chrysler’s $2.99 Gas Offer

Chrysler’s latest offer, valid until June 2, 2008, is a new gimick that just might hep increase their sales. Buy a new car, truck or SUV and get a debit card to buy gas. Via the card you only pay $2.99 a gallon for the next year! That’s quite a hedge — imagine if gas went up to $5 or $6 a gallon! For a 15,000 miles per year use on a 13 MPG Chrysler Aspen, you’re talking about over 1150 gallons of fuel. If the price rose $2 over the $2.99 level (it’s already almost $1 over), Chrysler would be on the hook for $2300 in losses! I suppose that’s not too much more than current rebates, so really it makes business sense.I don’t know the details, but I’d guess the card would be like a credit card where you’d get a rebate on the price of gas (100% above $2.99). If that were the case, Chrysler might make some money on the interest for unpaid monthly balances, so it could end up costing them a lot less!