Overview
The naphtha swaps market maintained a broadly cautious tone this week as players weighed conflicting signals across regions. A drone strike on Russia’s Ryazan refinery reignited supply concerns in the Eastern market, echoing earlier refinery disruptions and helping keep Eastern naphtha supported. Builds to inventories in both ARA and Singapore were reported this week. Nevertheless, sentiment remains relatively supported in the East, pushing the Dec’25 E/W above $42.00/mt to fresh seasonal highs. Still, the individual NWE and MOPJ cracks traded largely rangebound, underscoring the lack of strong fundamental pull from either region.
In the larger liquidity pools of NWE and MOPJ cracks, the Dec’25 NWE naphtha crack has traded relatively rangebound this week. Selling flows were observed this week, driven by trade houses closing their positions against Onyx and refiners flipping to a net short position. In the East, the Dec ’25 MOPJ crack also traded sideways but has seen higher lows over the week. This contract has seen higher highs and lows throughout November. Some refiner buying was seen this week, while trade houses closed some of their length in the contract.
The Dec’25 NWE gasnaph (EBOB – NWE Naphtha) fell from $140.27/mt on 17 Nov to $125.85/mt on 24 Nov. Bearish momentum has been introduced into this contract, as the MACD histogram flipped negative on 20 Nov. Refiners cut shorts this week, before reversing sentiment on 21 Nov in muted volumes.
The M1 C3 FEI/MOPJ rose from -$57.43/mt on 17 Nov to -$51.06/mt on 24 Nov, indicative of weakness in propane relative to naphtha; prices have continued to create new seasonal lows this week. We expect prices to consolidate this week and inch upwards from current levels. Flows in this contract were dominated by trade houses adding length early in the week before flipping sentiment to trim longs in muted volumes.
