SINGAPORE: The Asian naphtha crack inched up for the third straight session on Wednesday to reach a near two-week high of $134.70 a tonne as lower refinery run rates in Europe, caused by weak distillates margins, lent support.
Refinery run cuts in Europe will affect naphtha exports to Asia, which is structurally short of naphtha.
But sellers' concerns over additional supplies in Asia loomed as South Korea's SK Energy was out to sell naphtha mainly for August to December lifting, with the volumes coming from a new condensate splitter starting up in July, traders said.
A total of 10 medium-range vessel size cargoes are offered in the term contract, they added, which works out to an average of about 60,000 tonnes a month during the five-month period.
Separately, LG Chem was estimated to have bought a total of about 75,000 tonnes of naphtha, or three cargoes, for first-half August delivery to Yeosu and Daesan at premiums of $8.50 and $9.00 a tonne to Japan quotes on a cost-and-freight (C&F) basis, traders said.
This was 15 to 18 percent lower compared to what LG Chem had paid a week ago or a cargo scheduled for second-half July delivery.
GASOLINE CRACKS AT 4-WEEK HIGH
The Asian gasoline crack touched a four-week high of $9.36 a barrel on demand.
An outage at Taiwanese CPC's 80,000 barrels per day (bpd) gasoline-making unit at its Talin refinery is not expected to affect supplies, its spokesman said.
But the unexpected shutdown, which took place on Tuesday, came at a time of stronger demand due to the coming Muslim fasting month.
Indonesia had already indicated that it will import more gasoline in July at over 9.5 million barrels of 88-octane grade versus below 9 million for June.
CPC is expected to restart the unit at its Talin refinery in about seven days.
SINGAPORE CASH DEALS: One trade each on gasoline and naphtha.
BP bought from Trafigura a 92-octane gasoline for July 15-19 loading at $123.20 a barrel.
Total sold to Shell a first-half naphtha cargo at $979 a tonne.
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