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“Spark30S (Atlantic) freight rates experienced a third week-on-week drop, decreasing by $1,000 to $22,500 per day,” Spark’s data lead, Qasim Afghan, told LNG Prime on Friday.
He said that Spark25S (Pacific) rates dropped by $2,000 to $24,750 per day.
US tariffs
In Europe, the SparkNWE DES LNG dropped compared to $12.044/MMBtu last week.
“The SparkNWE DES LNG front month price for May is assessed at $10.184/MMBtu, dropping $1.86 since last week: this is the largest week-on-week drop since June 2023, as US tariff announcements continue to cause market turbulence,” Afghan said.
He said the discount to the TTF “remains relatively flat as compared to last week, currently at $0.725/MMBtu, still indicating increased demand for LNG delivery slots in NW-Europe.”
“Spark’s Intraday tool showed that, on Monday amidst the US tariff announcements, the US front month arb to NE-Asia (via the Cape of Good Hope) briefly reached breakeven levels, before closing out and pointing to Europe again, with the latest US arb assessment marginally closed at -$0.121/MMBtu,” he said.
Data by Gas Infrastructure Europe (GIE) shows that volumes in gas storages in the EU rose from last week and were 34.97 percent full on April 9.
Gas storages were 34.35 percent full on April 2, and 60.64 percent full on April 9, 2024.
JKM
In Asia, JKM, the price for LNG cargoes delivered to Northeast Asia in May 2025 settled at $12.605/MMBtu on Thursday.
Last week, JKM for May settled at 12.915/MMBtu on Friday, April 4.
Front-month JKM dropped to 12.775/MMBtu on Monday, 12.770/MMBtu on Tuesday, and 12.685/MMBtu on Wednesday.
State-run Japan Organization for Metals and Energy Security (Jogmec) said in a report earlier this week that JKM for last week fell to “low-$12s on April 4 from high-$12s the previous weekend.”
“After a modest move in the first half of the week before the US tariff announcement, the price fell to its lowest in eight months as concerns over the impact of it on the macroeconomy later in the week,” Jogmec said.