{
  "filename": "2026-08-24.md",
  "as_of": "2026-08-24",
  "title": "TFI sulfur squeeze and Canada export pace into late August",
  "dek": "Open trade press through mid-August left the North American sulfur desk on the same Tampa third-quarter molten print that closed July: $705 per long ton delivered, still the last public contract figure.",
  "path": "/outlook/2026-08-24/",
  "content": "# TFI sulfur squeeze and Canada export pace into late August\n\n*2026-08-24 · Sulfur Wire Outlook*\n\n![Formed sulfur at a Pacific bulk terminal, the visual of Alberta tonnes waiting on the Vancouver stem.](/assets/editorial/vancouver-harbour.jpg)\n\n{{chart:vancouver-exports}}\n\nOpen trade press through mid-August left the North American sulfur desk on the same Tampa third-quarter molten print that closed July: $705 per long ton delivered, still the last public contract figure. Argus reported that settlement on 13 July at https://www.argusmedia.com/en/news-and-insights/latest-market-news/2851577-tampa-3q-liquid-sulphur-price-hits-record-705-lt, up $50 per long ton from $655 in the second quarter, after the second quarter had already cleared the 2008 peak. The same open item put US Gulf spot solid exports at $1,100-1,150 per tonne FOB, including second-quarter cargoes to North Africa and East Africa. Licensed weekly assessment grids are not restated here.\n\nThe Fertilizer Institute, via an 18 August Fertilizer Daily write-up of Corey Rosenbusch's 6 August interview, framed sulfur as the next phosphate bottleneck. More than half of globally traded sulfur normally transits Hormuz. Commercial shipments have been described as near-zero since the Iran conflict. Russia's industrial sulfur export ban now runs through 31 December 2026. Rosenbusch said the squeeze already cut US phosphate runs, including four Mosaic plants earlier in the summer, and that Mosaic settled third-quarter molten at the same $705 per long ton. He asked Washington to treat sulfur as a supply-chain bottleneck alongside nitrogen and potash.\n\nThat association language is the political translation of a corridor failure CRU quantified in mid-July. Middle East sulfur exports have been down more than 1.0 million tonnes a month since March. Production loss is near 2.3 million tonnes. More than 0.5 million tonnes was loaded and stranded inside the Strait, with onshore Gulf inventory thought to exceed 1.0 million tonnes and regional production at 60-70 percent of pre-conflict rates. Even with de-escalation signals, CRU treated a return above 1 million tonnes a month as an August-September working view, slowed by vessel bottlenecks and restart risk, including a fatal explosion at Qatar's Barzan facility.\n\nUS Section 338 additional tariffs on a narrow slice of Canadian goods, about $20 billion, effective 22 August, are in their third day as of this brief. Open reporting from the Associated Press, NBC News, and USTR lists energy, potash, fish, and critical minerals as exempt. Elemental sulfur, Harmonized System 2503, is not named on the covered lists. Prime Minister Mark Carney said Ottawa will retaliate with targeted tariffs from 8 September, concentrated in steel, dairy, appliances, agricultural equipment, pulp and paper, and electronics. Canada remains the dominant US import source for recovered sulfur. USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026 put Canada's share of US recovered elemental sulfur imports at 53 percent for 2021-24, with sulfuric acid imports led by Canada at 54 percent. Net import reliance was 14 percent of apparent US consumption in 2025. Alberta forming plants and the Vancouver stem are watching whether later list text pulls HS 2503 into the fight.\n\nItafos second-quarter remarks, reported 9 August, said Conda's long-term sulfuric acid supply from Rio Tinto Kennecott, about 60 percent of Conda sulfur needs, was amended in May. Pricing moved off the Vancouver sulfur index onto Tampa, with collars against extreme moves. Chief executive David Delaney said Tampa sat below Vancouver through the quarter, so the change helped immediately. He put Vancouver spot near $1,100 per tonne through June with a small early-third-quarter dip, and said about 45 percent of global sulfur trade had moved through Hormuz before the conflict. China sulfuric acid exports were described as halted. Russia sulfur exports remain suspended through year-end. Kazakhstan transport was also reported suspended. The Conda amendment is a North American basis choice after both hubs rerated on the same shock.\n\nShanghai Metals Market's first-half 2026 chain review put Canada on a swing-supplier path: 2025 exports 4.25 million tonnes, up 40.7 percent year on year, and first-four-month 2026 value already $1.049 billion, annualized near 5.22 million tonnes, with Alberta and British Columbia more than 95 percent of national sulfur exports in that account. SMM described FOB Vancouver rising from about $500 per tonne in January to $825-950 per tonne by April, then warned that Hormuz reopening is not an instant fix. Mine clearance, stranded-vessel clearance, and damaged Gulf production may keep Middle East seaborne recovery slow into late summer. A 21 August SMM customs note put June Canadian elemental sulfur exports at 527,305 tonnes, down 15.43 percent month on month and 8.62 percent year on year, with Indonesia at 198,612 tonnes, the United States at 158,031 tonnes, and China only 32,730 tonnes. Sulphuric acid exports that month rose 101 percent to 123,140 tonnes, mostly to the United States.\n\nThe Vancouver Fraser Port Authority 2025 Statistics Overview, posted in March, confirms sulphur through the port at 3,507,428 metric tonnes, up 5 percent, with China at 1.30 million tonnes (down 16 percent), Australia 597,000 tonnes, Indonesia 371,000 tonnes, and the United States 302,000 tonnes (up 191 percent). That destination mix is the stem underneath SMM's national pace. China is still the largest listed trading economy and a smaller share of a larger harbour. SMM's own Chinese first-half import review put January-June 2026 at about 2.26 million tonnes, down 57.7 percent, with Gulf-4 share roughly halved and South Korea, Oman, and Canada rising to a combined 58 percent of the remaining mix. June Chinese imports of about 0.147 million tonnes marked a multi-year low. SunSirs had already put May at 268,300 tonnes, the second-lowest monthly volume in nearly 20 years, with MAP utilization toward 40 percent and DAP toward 30 percent.\n\nAlberta inventory remains the buffer that price can actually move. Argus, citing Alberta Energy Regulator data, put provincial sulfur stock at 11.66 million tonnes in July 2025, down 377,000 tonnes year on year and the lowest since May 2019. BC Insight's 23 March oil-sands note estimated oil sands contributed about 3.0 million tonnes, 63 percent of a 4.7 million tonne national elemental output, with about 1.5 million tonnes of blocked Canadian sulfur expected to be remelted across 2025-2030 as additional remelt capacity commissions by end-2026. Remelt, rail, forming, and terminal charges have often been cited above $150 per tonne. The FOB Vancouver path SMM described is what made that draw economic. Recovery itself still tracks bitumen and sour-gas throughput, not the sulfur bid. Early-June rainfall that held Lac la Biche-area wildfires near Cenovus, CNRL, and ConocoPhillips in-situ sites was a production-risk print, not a FOB print. The Fort McMurray and Edmonton capacity belt, about 2.2 million tonnes a year near Fort McMurray and about 700,000 around Edmonton, kept running.\n\nPhosphate rationing is now the demand-side clearing mechanism. CRU reported OCP cut Moroccan phosphate capacity by up to 50 percent through the second quarter. Mosaic curtailed at three US and Brazil locations. Separate Argus reporting said OCP had been near 50 percent in June but theoretically had enough sulfur to run full rates in July-August if logistics held. OCP's sale of a 50 percent stake in Jorf Fertilizers Company 1 to Koch Ag and Energy Solutions, lifting OCP-Koch joint-venture capacity to 2.5 million tonnes a year, reallocates phosphate capacity. It does not create sulfur tonnes. China's mid-March halt on MAP and DAP export declarations through August, and the near-total sulfuric acid export halt from early May after 4.65 million tonnes of acid exports in 2025, took the other large phosphate system off the seaborne board. Nickel Industries' late-June startup of the sulfuric acid plant at Excelsior Nickel Cobalt in Sulawesi adds a rigid HPAL bid that does not follow a Florida planting calendar.\n\nPublic reference hubs on the desk, open-news and industry_estimate anchors only, still show FOB Vancouver granular mid about $1,045 per tonne as of 1 June 2026 and FOB US Gulf granular mid about $1,125 per tonne as of 1 July 2026, a Vancouver-minus-Gulf basis of about $80 per tonne on those prints. USGS Mineral Industry Surveys remain paused during the ScienceBase migration, latest posted monthly through December 2025. MCS 2026 remains the annual production frame: US all-forms 8.1 million tonnes in 2025e, elemental recovered 7.6 million tonnes, world 84 million tonnes, Canada 5.0 million tonnes. No new HS 2503 headline table has changed the 2026 export pace versus 2025 in the August customs checks. The Port of Vancouver 2025 sulphur total of about 3.51 million tonnes remains the last full-year port anchor.\n\nThe corridor read into late August is therefore unchanged in structure and tighter in documentation. Alberta recovered sulfur still leaves mainly through the Vancouver stem. World supply shocks show up there as stem tightness, remelt draws, and a Gulf-versus-Pacific basis. Tampa at $705 per long ton and Gulf solids above $1,100 per tonne FOB are the Atlantic prints. Canada on a 5.22 million tonne annualized pace, with June still above 0.5 million tonnes even after a month-on-month cooling, is the Pacific print. HS 2503 is still off the US covered list on the third day of Section 338 duties. Hormuz dry-bulk sulfur is still impaired on the TFI and CRU accounts, whether or not about 40 oil tankers moved 16 million barrels of crude through the southern channel on the evening of 21 August. Crude tankers and formed sulfur do not share a charter list.\n\n## Key points\n\n- Last material open-news Tampa print: Q3 2026 molten $705/lt delivered (Argus, 13 Jul 2026). Mosaic Q3 sulfur settlement cited at that same figure in the TFI/Fertilizer Daily item.\n- US Section 338 Canada tariffs in force from 22 Aug on a narrow goods list; energy/potash/critical minerals exempt; HS 2503 sulfur not named.\n- TFI: Hormuz plus Russia ban removes two of three large traded sources; US phosphate curtailments already reported.\n- Itafos Conda acid contract: Vancouver index to Tampa index from May 2026 (industry_estimate, company remarks).\n- SMM: Canada sulfur exports on a ~5.22 Mt annualized 2026 pace after a 4.25 Mt 2025 print.\n- USGS MIS still paused; Alberta inventory series unchanged at last observation cutoff.\n- UNCERTAIN: whether Hormuz seaborne recovery in late summer restores Middle East tonnes fast enough to fade US Gulf solid-export diversion; whether Florida phosphate affordability caps further Tampa lifts.\n\n## 30-day watchlist\n\n- Any open USGS/MIS or equivalent US production print after ScienceBase migration.\n- VFPA monthly/destination updates and the next StatCan HS 2503 table that changes 2026 export pace vs 2025.\n- Public confirmation of Gulf loadings returning above 1 Mt/month, or of further phosphate run cuts.\n- Freight commentary on Vancouver-Asia vs US Gulf-Brazil lanes for netback context.\n- Covered-list text and Ottawa's 8 September retaliation calendar for any HS 2503 listing.\n\n## Sources\n\n- [Sulfur shortage threatens global phosphate supply (Fertilizer Daily, 18 Aug 2026)](https://www.fertilizerdaily.com/20260818-sulfur-shortage-phosphate-supply-afi-hormuz-warning/)\n- [US-Canada tariff reporting (AP, 22 Aug 2026)](https://apnews.com/article/canada-us-trade-tariffs-trump-857ef76b20a766e370d70176135b678e)\n- [Itafos Q2 earnings call highlights (Transcript Daily, 9 Aug 2026)](https://transcriptdaily.com/2026/08/09/itafos-q2-earnings-call-highlights.html)\n- [H1 2026 sulfur industry chain review (SMM)](https://news.metal.com/newscontent/103989791-smm-analysis-h1-2026-sulfur-industry-chain-review-extreme-volatility-under-supply-shocks)\n- [Tampa 3Q liquid sulphur price hits record $705/lt (Argus open news)](https://www.argusmedia.com/en/news-and-insights/latest-market-news/2851577-tampa-3q-liquid-sulphur-price-hits-record-705-lt)\n- [USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026 - Sulfur](https://pubs.usgs.gov/periodicals/mcs2026/mcs2026-sulfur.pdf)\n- Sulfur Wire desk 2026-08-24 (intel log)\n\n---\n\nPublic reference summary. Weekly PRA assessments require a commercial license. Not investment advice.\n"
}