Weekly Bitumen Report: Gradually Rising Prices in the Middle East
Freights at the Lowest
Bitumen increased last week after a long time of falling. The competition in Iran is leading the prices and the sentiment of the market a bit positive. The market participants in the country are expecting more coming rises as they are now forced to buy vacuum bottoms at a higher rate in addition to the dollar exchange decreasing rate against Rial.
The freights are also the lowest since the first of the year. Many are even below the breakeven point and they don’t know what to do as they aren’t seeing any strong demand in the markets.
Consequently, other markets such as India are looking into the market very closely as many think these rates are a good fortune for investing in their new cargoes.
The traders of crude oil are also monitoring the price movements and waiting for a new direction that ends the long going sideways. The economic reports are not very promising for the world. Different countries are worried about their future in the economy when they see a possibility of a recession.
In the Middle East, the new steel drum bitumen is in the range of $ 368 – $ 373 and the bulk bitumen is in the range of $ 276 – $ 281. The bulk of Singapore is volatile in the range of $ 440 – $ 445 and South Korea is currently $ 400 – $ 405.
This article was prepared by Mahnaz Golmohammadian, the account manager and market analyst of Infinity Galaxy.