According to the usual unreliable sources, unleaded gasoline (RB) is a seasonal market, but there are plenty of skeptics.

A logical way to check this out would be to analyze the June-September gasoline futures spread over the past 20 years. A simplistic study of this spread suggests the skeptics are right: Seasonality doesn’t exist or, if it does, it exists to such a slight extent as to be useless in real trading. However, a more detailed analysis produces a different conclusion: Gasoline seasonality is not only real, exceptions to it are infrequent.

Also, knowing when to look for this seasonality can lead to some genuinely interesting spread trade opportunities — not every year, to be sure, but often enough to make this a rewarding spread to monitor.