Four Paraxylene Asia Contract Price-based Sellers Typically Lower Their Nominations

The four paraxylene Asia Contract Price-based sellers, ExxonMobil, Idemitsu Kosan, JX Nippon Oil and Energy and S-Oil, who typically lower their nominations to meet bid levels have not done so for the February ACP as spot prices have increased, sources close to the negotiations said Thursday. 

Last week, the four producers nominated their February ACPs -- ExxonMobil and JX at $1,720/mt CFR, S-Oil at $1,730/mt CFR and Idemitsu at $1,750/mt CFR. Thursday is the last day for negotiations over the February ACP. 

The producers typically begin reducing their nomination values on the last negotiation day in order to narrow the gap with buyers' counter bids. But for February negotiations, no renominations were heard so far. The sources said Idemitsu decided not to revise its February nomination at $1,750/mt CFR. 

"The current spot price is at a pretty similar level to initial nomination prices," one of the sources said. "The sellers are unwilling to reduce their nominations." 

Early Thursday, the CFR Taiwan/China PX price was pegged at $1,718.50/mt. 

There are six ACP buyers -- BP, Taiwan's Capco, Oriental Petrochemical (Taiwan) Corp., Japan's Mitsui Chemicals and Mitsubishi Chemical, and China's Yisheng Petrochemical. Buyers' counter bids were heard to have increased to $1,660-1,670/mt CFR from $1,600/mt CFR initially.