Spot styrene monomer stocks in East China fell to 78,000 mt this week, the lowest level so far in 2012, down 12,600 mt from the previous week, sources said Thursday.
The last time the inventory was at this level was in the second week of December last year, when it stood at 74,700 mt.
The fall in stocks could be a reason why Asian SM rose Wednesday by $22.50/mt to $1,400/mt FOB Korea and $1,422/mt CFR China.
Also, once Saudi Polymers' 200,000 mt/year polystyrene plant at Al Jubail, Saudi Arabia, starts up, which seems imminent according to industry sources, it is likely to take 200,000 mt/year of spot SM out of the market. It will be getting its supply from Jubail Chevron Philips Company's 777,000 mt/year SM plant at Al Jubail.
Another factor supporting Asian SM prices is reduced supply from the US as producer Styrolution has declared force majeure on its North American styrene business for August.
Styrolution's 950 million lb (430,900 mt/year) Sarnia, Ontario, facility has been shut due to a crack in a heat exchanger after a fire on July 24 and will remain down until the end of October for maintenance, the source added.
Styrolution's 1 billion lb/year (453,600 mt/year) Texas City styrene facility has been shut since the end of May for scheduled maintenance.
Also, Westlake Chemical has kept its 570 million lb/year (258,600 mt/year) Lake Charles, Louisiana, facility shut through August for a turnaround.
But Asian traders did not seem to be very concerned about the outages in the US.
"Not so big an impact, the arbitrage [from the US to Asia] is already closed and Asia is tight already," a Northeast Asian trader said Thursday.
Another trader said it was unlikely that Asian SM would be shipped to the US "as the voyage time is too long."
The FOB US Gulf SM price was assessed at $1,504/mt on Wednesday, up about $26/mt from Tuesday.
