The Platts JKM for October deliveries closed at $5.45/MMBtu Thursday, down 10 cents on the week, on expectations of increased supply availability in the face of weak seasonal demand and an initially muted market reaction to Kogas' nuclear plant shutdown earlier this week.
Offers for October-delivery cargoes to North Asia were heard ranging in the mid- to high-$5s/MMBtu Thursday, while bids from traders looking to optimize positions in North Asia were at $5.35/MMBtu.
Sources were increasingly confident about Angolan LNG's September 25 re-start, followed by APLNG Train 2's startup in early-October.
In addition to ExxonMobil's upcoming tenders from Gorgon, Chevron was heard to have upcoming incremental supply from the project in October.
Sources said Russia's Sakhalin issued a sell tender on a DES basis offering two November-loading cargoes, with the first to load on November 5.
In addition, Sabine Pass is expected to resume production at end-October, following maintenance, and Indonesia's Bontang issued a three-cargo tender Friday for either FOB or DES volumes available for November and December. Bontang's long-term contract offtakers and the domestic Indonesian market have priority over these volumes but their demand levels remain muted.
Indian buyers appeared to be the most active throughout the week as the market remained focused on pricing updates from the GSPC and GAIL buy tenders.
There were unconfirmed reports of these being awarded at $5.70/MMBtu and the mid-$5s/MMBtu, respectively.
In North Asia, South Korea shut down four reactors, totaling 2.8 GW of capacity, on Tuesday following the country's biggest earthquake. Asian traders were also continuing to monitor the impact of the shutdown, but it did not immediately impact the market as participants understood the shutdown to be just for routine safety checks.
On Friday, Korea's Kogas was heard discretely buying cargoes from the spot market, and was reported to have secured additional volumes from Indonesia ahead of winter, though this could not be verified. On Friday, the November JKM, became the new front month, rolled at $5.625/MMBtu on increasing demand. This followed unconfirmed reports at the end of the week that recent November deals had been concluded into Asia and Middle East recently between $5.70-$5.80/MMBtu.
