Petroleum coke market monthly report（4.01-4.26）

ICC News: This month petroleum coke market maintains steady performance this month. The number of Sinopec’s refineries that have gone into maintenance is on the rise and the supply is dropping. For instance, a set of 500,000t coking facilities at Anqing Petrochemical have shut down, the 1Mt coking facilities at Shanghai Petrochemical and the high-sulphur coke facilities at Yangzi Petrochemical are currently in maintenance, which drag the operating rate of Sinopec down to 69.83 percent. Given factors concerning self-use and exports, the operating rate of Sinopec in fact only stands at 48.08 percent. The amount of supply for external markets remains tight at this point. Overall price at PetroChina maintain steady; after the price increase move by northeast-located Daqing and Fushun units, the rest of its refineries didn’t show the tendency to follow the footstep; its northwest-located refineries have all removed preferential measures for bulk purchases, with medium-sulphur coke now prevalently traded at 1,600-1,700 yuan/mt. The coking facilities at Lanzhou Petrochemical have been shut down, making supply dropping accordingly now. The supply end at CNOOC didn’t show any changes.
On the downstream front, calcined petroleum coke remains stuck in downward spiral, and prices partially gone up. A general rise of 50 yuan/mt in Daqing, Fushun and Dagong petroleum coke have sparkled mild hike in low-sulphur calcined coke price. Some calcined petroleum coke enterprises have also raised the price of calcined petroleum coke by 50-100 yuan/mt. As for high-sulphur petroleum coke, there isn’t much change on both supply and demand side. Estimates hold demand fundamentals of low-sulphur calcined petroleum coke are unlikely to improve later, sparking the concern over shipment among low-sulphur calcined petroleum coke enterprises. With upward trend in April’s operating rate, the severe situation in medium-sulphur calcined petroleum coke will somewhat be eased. Right now, in northeast region, mainstream trade prices for low-sulphur calcined coke are 2,350-2,800 yuan/mt on the lower end and 2,950-3,150 yuan/mt on the higher end; medium-sulphur calcined coke are 1,800-2,400 yuan/mt in north region and 1,700-2,200 yuan/mt in Shandong; high-sulphur calcined coke are 1,600-1,800 yuan/mt.