A 7,000 mt cargo of ethylene was heard fixed from Terneuzen in the Netherlands for delivery into the east amid the outage late last month at Shell’s Singapore cracker, a broker said Wednesday.
Shell declared force majeure at the cracker earlier this month, according to industry sources. A Shell spokesman attributed the shutdown to “maintenance work”, but declined to say which parts of the facility were undergoing maintenance and how long it would last. The cracker produces 960,000 mt/year of ethylene.
Meanwhile, European ethylene supply is turning from tight to balanced with restarts at both Shell’s German Wesseling and Dutch Moerdijk crackers.
EU spot prices have weakened to Eur900/mt ($984/mt) FD NWE Tuesday from Eur928/mt FD NWE in the beginning of the month. Asian prices were assessed at $1,055/mt CFR Wednesday, unchanged on the day.
Participants decided to stay on the sidelines Wednesday amid volatile crude futures as well as uncertainty over the shutdown at Shell’s Singapore steam cracker.
January ICE Brent crude futures fell 29 cents/b on the day to be assessed at $40.77/b at 4:30 pm Singapore time (0830 GMT) Wednesday.
The US has continued to export to both Asia and Europe amid a supply glut. One cargo is set for Asia and two for Europe, all loading in December-January.
US spot ethylene recovered 0.25 cent on Tuesday to reach 18.25/lb ($402) FD USG, hovering near its lowest level since it was assessed at 17.5 cents/lb FD USG on December 18, 2008.
