SINGAPORE, May 17 (Reuters) - The Asian naphtha price rose for the first time this week to
reach a three-session high of $867.75 a tonne on Friday, with its margin edging up to a
two-session high of $88.88 a tonne as a refinery outage in India lifted sentiment.
A fire broke out late on Thursday at state-run refiner Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd's 8.3
million tonnes a year Visakhapatnam refinery on India's east coast, officials said.
This led to the shut down of a 3 million tonnes a year crude distillation unit (CDU) at the
refinery, but the extent of the damage and losses due to it was not yet known.
Vitol has a deal with HPCL to lift up to 30,000 tonnes of naphtha from the refinery on May
25-27.
But the Asian gasoline margin did not react to the fire and in fact fell for the fourth
straight session to reach its lowest in about a week of $7.85 a barrel.
Cash trades were absent with traders saying there was likely just one bid in the Singapore
market against at least three offers.
Traders were likely still feeling the effects of weak demand in the U.S. despite upcoming
summer driving season.
But gasoline stocks independently held in Europe's Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp hub dropped
15.9 percent this week to nearly 900,000 tonnes, data from Dutch oil analyst Pieter Kulsen
showed on Thursday.
* NAPHTHA TENDERS: Indian Oil Corp (IOC) has bought 14,000 tonnes of naphtha for June 5-9
arrival at Mangalore in a rare move as it usually exports the light fuel.
- The premium paid was around $72.50 a tonne on a cost-and-freight (C&F) basis.
- But IOC sold 30,000 tonnes naphtha for June 3-5 loading from Kandla to Vitol at a premium
of about $26.00-$27.00 a tonne to Middle East quotes on a free-on-board (FOB) basis.
- Reliance Industries sold 55,000 tonnes naphtha to an oil major at premiums of about $30 a
tonne to Middle East quotes on a FOB basis.
* NAPHTHA CASH DEALS: MRI sold a first-half July/second-half July naphtha spread deal Shell
at $4.75 a tonne, making this the only cash deal of the day.
LIGHT DISTILLATES
CASH ($/T) ASIA Change % Change Prev RIC
CLOSE Close
OSN Naphtha CFR Japan M1 867.75 11.75 1.37 856.00 (NAF-1H-TYO)
OSN Naphtha CFR Japan M2 858.50 11.50 1.36 847.00 (NAF-2H-TYO)
OSN Naphtha Diff 9.25 0.25 2.78 9.00 (NAF-TYO-DIF)
Naphtha Netback FOB Sing 93.89 1.33 1.44 92.56 (NAF-SIN)
Naphtha Diff FOB Sing 1.59 0.03 1.92 1.56 (NAF-SIN-DIF)
Naphtha-Brent Crack 88.88 5.98 7.21 82.90 (NAF-SIN-CRK)
Gasoline 97 117.32 0.60 0.51 116.72 (GL97-SIN)
Gasoline 95 114.70 0.63 0.55 114.07 (GL95-SIN)
Gasoline 92 111.70 0.60 0.54 111.10 (GL92-SIN)
Gasoline crack 7.85 -0.17 -2.12 8.02 (GL92-SIN-CRK)
SWAPS ($/T) ASIA Change % Change Prev RIC
CLOSE Close
(0830
GMT)
Brent M1 103.76 0.85 0.83 102.91
Naphtha CFR Japan M1 855.50 10.00 1.18 845.50
Naphtha CFR Japan M1/M2 3.75 0.00 0.00 3.75
Naphtha CFR Japan M2 851.75 10.00 1.19 841.75
Naphtha Japan-Sing Netback M1 18.50 -1.25 -6.33 19.75
Naphtha Japan-Sing Netback M2 21.50 -1.25 -5.49 22.75
Naphtha FOB Sing M1 93.00 1.25 1.36 91.75
Naphtha FOB Sing M1/M2 0.75 0.00 0.00 0.75
Naphtha FOB Sing M2 92.25 1.25 1.37 91.00
Naphtha Cracks M1 -9.12 0.43 -4.50 -9.55
East-West Naphtha M1 17.25 -1.00 -5.48 18.25
East-West Naphtha M2 17.50 -0.50 -2.78 18.00
NWE Naphtha M1 838.25 11.00 1.33 827.25
NWE Naphtha M1/M2 4.00 0.50 14.29 3.50
NWE Naphtha M2 834.25 10.50 1.27 823.75
Crack NWE Naphtha-Brent M1 -11.07 0.48 -4.16 -11.55
Crack NWE Naphtha-Brent M2 -11.26 0.48 -4.09 -11.74
*Sing refers to Singapore
(Reporting by Seng Li Peng; Editing by Alison Birrane)
