Asia's naphtha crack rose 7.48 percent, or $3.92, to $56.33 a tonne on Thursday, the highest since Dec. 28, supported by a stream of demand. South Korea's LG Chem snapped up naphtha for second-half April delivery at premiums in the range of $3.25 to $4.50 a tonne to Japan quotes on a cost-and-freight (C&F) basis. LG Chem's purchase has come in the same week as Lotte Chemical, SK Energy, Malaysia-based Titan and Taiwan's Formosa have in total bought more than 230,000 tonnes of naphtha for second-half April delivery.

Formosa alone bought 100,000 tonnes of open-specification grade averaging a premium of under $2 a tonne to its own price formula on a cost-and-freight (C&F) basis for second-half April delivery to Mailiao after skipping purchases for first-half April arrival, trade sources said. SK Energy paid premiums of $5 a tonne and above, while Titan paid a low single digit premium.

Asia's gasoline crack rose to $6.66 a barrel, the highest since October 12. Inventories in the United States and Singapore moved in different directions. While US gasoline stocks fell by 4.6 million barrels last week, Singapore's onshore light distillates inventories rose to 16.5 million barrels, just 2.2 percent below the record high of 16.9 million barrels in late February, official data showed.

Copyright Reuters, 2019