Oct-Nov Methanol Import Volume Forecast
With the influences of factors such as the typhoon-caused port congestion and the issues with cargo itself further weakening, the unloading of imported cargo accelerated substantially after the National Day holiday, and the overall import arrival volume was relatively stable. The import volume in October was estimated at 1,226.6kt, down 22.2kt or 1.78% MOM.
In terms of import origin, the import volume from Saudi Arabia, Trinidad, Malaysia and Qatar increased to 93.7kt, 58kt, 31.5kt and 19.1kt respectively. The import volume of cargoes from a certain country in the Middle East was predicted to decrease by 4.31% MOM to 880.8kt, as the unloading cycle of some cargoes was prolonged due to some issues. In addition, the import volume from a certain country in South America was projected to decline to 48kt and that from a certain country in Europe, 40kt.
In terms of arrival area, the volume of cargo arriving in Jiangsu was estimated at 721.1kt in October, up 169.9kt or 30.82% MOM. The volume of cargo arriving in South China advanced to 155kt, but that of cargo arriving in Tianjin dropped notably. In a bid to optimize feedstock costs, most of the important downstream plants chose to purchase some cheap inland resources to replace high-priced imports, so the proportion of imported cargoes flowing into important downstream plants fell to 47.92% in October, down 18.08 percentage points MOM. Accordingly, more cargoes were diverted to public storage tank farms, especially those in Jiangsu.
Looking ahead to November, for one thing, more units have been shut down for maintenance in the Middle East. For another, overseas methanol producers give preference to sold goods to the regions with high methanol prices, so it’s hard for the import volume of non-Iranian cargoes to see substantial growth. Overall, SCI reckons that China’s methanol import volume may be 1,180-1,200kt in November.
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