It’s been a bullish fortnight in the gasoline complex: The Apr EBOB crack rallied despite persistent selling from trade houses, refiners and funds. The support, which took the crack up $3/bbl in the two weeks to Mar 18 was thus perhaps a function of EBOB FP and spread buying. By contrast, the Sing 92 E/W remained depressed these past two weeks with prices sinking from -$8.25/bbl on Mar 05 to -$10.50/bbl come Mar 18. This weakness came despite buying from a range of players perhaps due to the magnitude of EBOB’s strength.
In addition, the TA arb found more support this past fortnight amid stronger RINs, and buying from funds and refiners despite trade houses selling over 1mbbls of the prompt tenor. Finally, the prompt gasnaph contract saw initial weakness but soon after recorded a rally taking prices from $180/mt on Mar 08 to $210/mt 10 days later. This strength emerged despite the usual gasnaph selling from refiners perhaps due to EBOB’s strength relative to European naphtha.