Asian naphtha crack rises for third straight day to near 3-1/2 month high

25-Apr-14

The Asian naphtha crack rose for the third straight day on Thursday to nearly a 3-1/2 month high of US$153.30/ton, boosted by supply concerns over delays in cargoes from Algeria and low Indian spot volumes, as per Reuters. About 255,000 tonnes of Algerian naphtha bound for Asia arrival in June will be delayed by 7-10 days following an outage at a condensate splitter. Algeria's largest refinery, the 335,000 bpd Skikda plant, cut its condensate splitter output by half following the outage. "Traders who are affected by the delays can opt to buy Indian cargoes from the spot market for second-half May loading. But they would need to pay up if they really need to secure the cargoes," said a Singapore-based trader. But India has been slow to offer cargoes due to domestic demand and earlier refinery maintenance at a Reliance Industries crude unit. India's April exports at about 450,000 tons were the lowest in at least three years, Reuters data showed. So far,India has sold some 300,000 tons for May loading.