LNG

There was some hope that the level of activity in the market this week would be able to push rates up, ships out there had several cargoes and tenders to choose from with charterers looking West of Suez for optionality and flexibility on tonnage. Rates though didn’t react; yet. There is a Mexican standoff scenario unfolding, ships willing to look are also reluctant, as though they will get fixed the market could turn and fixing at such low levels could hamper their overall year, but adversely those looking to fix in are finding ships with optionality harder to pin down despite perhaps looking at paying up from the lows of the first quarter.

The rates themselves didn’t move much, out in the East BLNG1 Aus-Japan still is working for the most part on BB to Hub with rates on the 174cbm coming down $1,887 to $46,235 while the 160cbm moved up to a close of $37,010. As previously stated, the Atlantic was stronger which was reflected in the rates, BLNG2 Houston-Continent rose by $6,654 on the 174cbm and by $4,949 on the 160cbm to close at $49,694 and $37,521 respectively. BLNG3 Houston-Japan made similar gains and the 174cbm finished at $56,603 while the 160cbm closed at $43,995. The Atlantic market is working on BB to loadport dynamics currently.

Period on the shorter terms saw gains as conversations now mean ships fixed will be fixed over the winter months, and 6-month terms rose by $11,900 to $86,500 while 1-year closed at $79,800 down $300 and the 3-year up by $600 closed at $82,300.

 

LPG

There were two tales this week for LPG, the market out in the East where BLPG1 Ras Tanura-Chiba had some big swings, and ended ultimately with a miss and then the west where BLPG2 and BLPG3 Houston-Flushing and Houston-Chiba were as flat as we have almost ever seen them.

BLPG1 Ras Tanura-Chiba begun at $88.714 and rose up to a high of $93.214 before a big drop to $82 close and a TCE Earning equivalent of $64,901 which overall meant a drop of $6.714. BLPG2 Houston-Flushing barely moved on the week ending down 20 cents and moving only 40 cents on the week with a final price of $81.4 and a daily TCE earning equivalent of $89,185. BLPG3 Houston-Chiba opened and closed at $146.571 with ultimately no change though some slight variations throughout the week.