Asia's naphtha crack extended gains to reach a four-session high of $87.20 a tonne on Friday on strong demand this week. South Korea's Lotte Chemical has bought two cargoes totalling about 50,000 tonnes of naphtha for first-half March delivery at a discount of $6.00 to $6.50 a tonne to Japan quotes on a cost-and-freight (C&F) basis.
This purchase came in the same week that Taiwan's Formosa, South Korea's LG Chem and Hanwha and Malaysia-based Titan bought a total of at least 150,000 tonnes of the feedstock for first-half March delivery. Taiwan's CPC is now seeking 35,000 tonnes of heavy naphtha and 35,000 tonnes of full-range naphtha for March 5-25 arrival at Kaohsiung through a tender.
The Taiwanese refiner and petrochemicals maker has just sealed a deal this week for full-range naphtha delivery between March and December at a discount of $5.50 a tonne to Japan quotes on a C&F basis. Some traders expect spot discounts to gradually return to the positive zone but only after March as heavy prompt supplies need time to ease. MRPL sold 35,000 tonnes of naphtha for March 2-4 loading from New Mangalore to Japanese Marubeni at a premium of about $7.40 a tonne to Middle East quotes on a free-on-board (FOB) basis, down by more than 50 percent compared with the average premium it had fetched for three cargoes sold for February loading. Japan's Asahi Kasei Corp said on Friday it would shut its 504,000 tonnes per year Mizushima naphtha cracker permanently around mid-February.
Comments
Comments are closed.