Asia's naphtha crack recovered to a two-day high of $98.15 a tonne on Friday as demand emerged after the seasonal lull. Japan's Asahi Kasei bought open-specification naphtha for second-half February delivery at premiums below $20 a tonne to Japan quotes on a cost-and-freight (C&F) basis, pegged to second-half December pricing formula, industry sources said.

The petrochemical maker may have also bought light grade naphtha through private negotiations but no details were available.

Asahi Kasei, which operates a 567,000 tonnes per year (tpy) cracker in Mizushima, on Dec. 23 bought a naphtha cargo for second-half January delivery.

Overall, Japan's total naphtha imports for the first 11 months of this year at 12.14 million tonnes is down by about 3.3% versus the same period in 2018.

Japan's gasoline sales in the meantime eased 0.6% to 844,362 barrels per day versus a year ago, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) said on Friday.

India's HPCL has postponed the loading dates for a 17,000-tonne naphtha cargo from Mumbai offered on Dec. 24 by a day to Jan 14-16.

The tender is expected to be awarded next Monday.

BPCL has two outstanding tenders due next Monday to sell a total of 70,000 tonnes of naphtha for January shipment. It had offered 35,000 tonnes of naphtha for Jan. 10-11 loading from Kochi and another 35,000 tonnes for Jan. 7-8 loading from Mumbai.

BPCL's recent sales premiums garnered for cargoes sold for late December loading from Kochi were near record high prices of above $60 a tonne to Middle East quotes on a free-on-board (FOB) basis.