SUBSCRIBER NOTE: Platts launches West African grade gasoline cargo assessments

Platts launches two new assessments relating to imports of gasoline into West Africa: West Africa Gasoline FOB Northwest Europe, and West Africa Gasoline CIF West Africa as stated in a subscriber note published August 27. Both new assessments are launched on September 3, 2015.

These new assessments reflect gasoline with a maximum of 1000 ppm sulfur, min 91 RON, maximum 9.0 PSI and a maximum density of 0.735 Kg/L at 60 degrees Fahrenheit. In its assessment process, Platts will publish bids and offers for other merchantable gasoline grades appropriate for West African delivery, and normalize these back to the reference specification.

The FOB Northwest European assessment is basis FOB Amsterdam, with bids and offers from other locations in Northwest Europe normalized back to Amsterdam.

The FOB NWE cargo assessment represents cargoes of 34,000 mt plus/minus 10% tolerance with other cargo sizes also considered for assessment purposes but normalized back to the reference cargo size.

Platts will publish West African grade gasoline FOB cargo bids and offers that limit a counterparty's price exposure to operational tolerance, so that pricing occurs after loading. Platts will accept FOB cargo bids and offers for consideration in its assessment process that price out any volumes related to operational tolerance after the loading date.

The new Platts CIF West Africa assessment is calculated as a freight net-forward from the FOB Northwest European assessment, using a basket of two Worldscale flat rates; Amsterdam-Lome and Amsterdam-Lagos. The 2015 Worldscale flat rate used to calculate the net-forward formula for the CIF assessment is $19.11/mt. This CIF assessment is calculated by multiplying the Worldscale flat rate by the Platts daily tanker rate assessment for UKC-West Africa 37,000 mt cargoes (PFAMH00) and adding it to the FOB Northwest European assessment.

Platts welcomes all feedback and questions to europe_products@platts.com, with a cc to pricegroup@platts.com. For written comments, please provide a clear indication if comments are not intended for publication by Platts for public viewing. Platts will consider all comments received and will make comments not marked as confidential available upon request.