SINGAPORE: Asia’s naphtha crack slipped on Tuesday to the lowest since mid-December, amid muted buying interest as buyers stayed on the sidelines.

The naphtha market has weakened as demand in Asia is expected to slow with crackers heading into maintenance season while some cracker operators are replacing naphtha with liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) as petrochemical feedstock, traders said.

On Tuesday, PTT Global Chemical PCL said that it has resumed normal operations at its petrochemical units following an outage last week.

Heavy rain and storms caused the outage, an official from PTTGC, PTT Group’s petrochemical flagship.

Separately, gasoline markets remained supported by expectations of summer travel demand, particularly in the United States, and lower exports from China.

However, increasing COVID-19 cases in India and a renewed lockdown in New Delhi could weigh on the world’s third largest consumer’s fuel demand, traders said. Indian refiners IOC and Nayara have each issued a tender to sell May-loading gasoline cargoes.

Taiwan’s Formosa Petrochemical Corp plans to ramp up operating rates at its refinery in May to 74% once it restarts a gasoline-making unit after maintenance and as refining margins have improved, the company’s spokesman said.