Europe benzene market enjoys healthy demand as buying activity picks up

Vasiliki Parapouli

02-Jun-2017

Europe benzene buying activity picks upLONDON (ICIS)–The €17/tonne decrease in the Europe June benzene contract price met expectations of most market participants, sources said on Friday.

The week before the monthly contract settlement the market was quiet and activity was rather subdued.

However, as May was drawing to a close, sources witnessed a real pick up in purchasing activity.

On Wednesday, there were several June trades done at $804-850/tonne, while on Friday morning June traded at a lower level of $780/tonne.

As the month kicks in, demand is looking reasonable from both the downstream phenol and styrene markets and according to expectations for this time of the year.

The Chinese market has been quite demanding the past couple of weeks and sources are monitoring to see how this trend could develop.

On the import side, players said that it is unclear whether there will be some cargoes arriving mainly from Asia, not so much from the Middle East or India, and how big these volumes can be.

A trader said that the market was not looking bullish at the moment, adding that it does not expect big changes in pricing in July and August.

On the production side, sources said that there have not been any serious problems so far which could be considered pretty rare for the European benzene market.

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