The international crude oil rose sharply, the demand for asphalt for terminal road works remained low, and the domestic asphalt market was stable as a whole, which was less affected by the crude oil price. According to the price monitoring data of SunSirs, the asphalt price on January 8 was 2,480 RMB/ ton, up 0.71% from the beginning of the week.

Last week, the international crude oil market was frequently bullish. The OPEC agreement was reached and Saudi Arabia reduced production by an additional 1 million barrels/ day. Data showed that the U.S. crude oil inventory fell. Last week, the price of WTI crude oil exceeded the $50/ barrel mark, with a weekly increase of 7.67%, and the price of Brent crude oil increased 8.09%.

International oil prices rose sharply, but domestic asphalt market demand remained low. The demand for asphalt in East China, South China and southwest China has little change and basically remains stable; the road demand in Northeast and Northwest China has basically ended, and some refineries are ready to produce coking; the terminal projects in South China are still in a rush state, which has a certain support for the rigid demand for asphalt; the operating rate of asphalt plant decreased slightly last week, and the reduction was mainly concentrated in Shandong, North China and Northeast China. Production reduction areas were mainly lack of asphalt demand areas. The market supply of finishing asphalt was sufficient, which had a certain suppressive effect on asphalt price.

SunSirs analysts believe that with the advance of vaccination and the favorable support of production reduction in OPEC countries such as Saudi Arabia, oil prices are expected to rise further. However, the lack of effective demand support in the asphalt market can not boost the market price. It is expected that China domestic asphalt price will stabilize or fall.

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