RBOB Gasoline (RB) delivery months at a glance — every contract's record over its tenure as the lead month.
Futures Seasonality · Contract-Month Study
Every contract 2010–2026, measured over its tenure as the lead contract · Updated for 2026
Gasoline’s famous calendar, the giant February pop and the ugly autumn slide, hides a secret: a meaningful piece of it lives in the price gaps between contracts, not inside them. Measure each RB contract over its own tenure, with no roll gaps, and the picture changes. The October contract, leading through gasoline’s supposedly worst weeks, turns out to be the best on the board.
Most seasonality tables slice the calendar. This one slices the contracts. Each delivery month below is measured over its time as the lead contract: from the open of the day it takes over the front of the board to the close of the day it hands off the lead. No roll gaps, no splicing, one contract per observation. An RB contract leads for roughly a month, ending a few sessions before its expiration when volume hands off to the next month, the same roll convention used across all Traders Brief research. Because each observation is a single contract, the summer-to-winter grade gaps that inflate calendar-month numbers never touch these figures.
RBOB Gasoline (RB) — Average Change by Contract Month
Average change while each contract leads the board. Hover any bar for the detail.
Each row is a delivery month: how many of its contracts since 2010 rose while leading, the average change over the tenure, and the average high-to-low range. “Typically leads” is the median window that contract runs the board.
| Contract | Typically leads | Up / Down | Win rate | Avg change | Avg range |
|---|
Table view doubles as the accessible read of the chart above.
The October contract is the board’s quiet champion. The V contract, the first winter-grade delivery, leads from mid-August to mid-September, exactly the stretch the calendar calls gasoline’s worst. Yet it has risen in 12 of 16 tenures (75%). It takes the board already priced at the cheaper winter specification, so the seasonal cliff is behind it before it ever leads. That is the difference between a month and a contract.
The famous February fireworks shrink inside a single contract. The calendar-month study shows February gasoline up 13.3% on average, but the February (G) contract itself averages a far tamer 3.9% while leading. The rest of that calendar number rides the roll, the jump from winter-grade to summer-grade contracts that happens between months, not within one. Both readings are true. Knowing which one you are trading is the point.
Within the contracts, the real weakness is September and the year-end. The U contract has risen just 6 of 16 times averaging a 2.0% loss, with the December and January contracts leaning nearly as soft. Meanwhile the driving-season build shows up honestly in the May, June, and August contracts, all winning at 62% or better with average gains near 3 to 4%.
A contract’s record tells you how its month has treated the lead position historically. It doesn’t tell you where the current lead contract sits today, whether this cycle is tracking the record or fighting it, or the levels that matter into the next session. That is what The Traders Brief does every morning, across energy, metals, and the indexes.
See today’s read →Which gasoline contract month is historically strongest?
The October (V) contract, up 12 of 16 tenures (75%) while leading from mid-August to mid-September. As the first winter-grade delivery, it takes the board after the seasonal grade discount is already in the price.
Which gasoline contract month is weakest?
The September (U) contract, up just 6 of 16 (38%) with an average loss of 2.0%, followed closely by the December contract.
Why is the February contract’s gain so much smaller than February’s calendar number?
The calendar-month figure spans the mid-winter roll from winter-grade into summer-grade contracts, and the specification premium between them inflates it. Inside the February contract alone, with no roll gap, the average gain is 3.9% rather than 13.3%.
Contract tendencies are drawn from 16 years of individual RBOB Gasoline futures contract history (2010–2026), each measured over its own tenure as the lead contract, and describe the past. They are not a forecast and not trading advice. Markets can and do trade against their record in any given year. © 2026 The Traders Brief.