Styrene:United States

摘要

US domestic styrene buyers were anticipating a 2- to 3- cent increase in September contracts as benzene and ethylene prices have moved higher in recent weeks. The increase would put domestic contracts above 50 cents/lb, a source said. The jump in feedstock costs also translated into higher prices in the domestic market this week, with an August deal heard done at 48.5 cents/lb. An outage at Shell’s Deer Park cracker sent ethylene spot prices above 41 cents/lb this week. And spot benzene was trading near 300 cents/gal. At those levels, variable costs were near 47 cents/lb. Producers will usually add 3 cents on top of variable costs to cover fixed cost and margins, putting offers notionally between 50 and 51 cents/lb.