Platts Japan May LNG imports fall to 5.75 mil mt, lowest volume since Oct 2010
Japan’s LNG imports fell 11.4% year on year to 5.75 million mt in May, the lowest volume since October 2010 when it was 5.22 million mt, data released Monday by the Ministry of Finance showed.
Mild temperatures and sluggish demand in downstream markets were partly responsible for the decline in imports, it added.
Shipments from Australia fell 14.8% from a year ago to 1.2 million mt due to the unplanned shutdown of the North West Shelf plant in Western Australia.
Australia was, however, still the biggest supplier of LNG to Japan.
Imports from Malaysia and Qatar, the second and third largest suppliers, also registered a fall in May. Malaysia sent 0.98 million mt of LNG, down 12.5% from a year earlier and 11.3% from April.
Imports from Qatar slipped 4.7% year on year and 20.6% month on month to 0.96 million mt.
No LNG cargoes came from European countries in May despite the wider spread between the JKM Marker and National Balancing Point.
The spread widened by more than $1/MMBtu, in particular toward the end of the month, with July JKM around $7.70/MMBtu and ICE NBP futures for July around $6.50/MMBtu.
Japan Customs Cleared crude oil price was $59.227/barrel for May, down 45.7% from a year earlier but up 5.6% from April.
Some of Japan’s long-term LNG contracts are linked to the JCC crude price but with a lag of a few months, so fluctuations in oil prices typically take some time to be reflected in LNG prices.
