Argus assessed Vancouver sulfur at $72 per tonne FOB midpoint on 14 December 2023, down 25 percent since the start of the fourth quarter as Chinese demand waned and rising freight rates trimmed FOB netbacks. Soft Vancouver prices pressured North American liquid settlements into early 2024. The viewpoint is at https://www.argusmedia.com/en/news-and-insights/latest-market-news/2523114-viewpoint-global-softness-to-pressure-northam-sulfur.
That $72 print is an industry-estimate midpoint from open Argus news, not a licensed weekly assessment grid restated here. USGS placed Tampa fourth-quarter 2023 at $102 per long ton after a mid-July trough of $55. Argus said market participants expected the first-quarter 2024 Tampa settlement to track soft Vancouver and US Gulf spot into the mid-$60s to low-$70s per long ton delivered. USGS later recorded Tampa opening 2024 at $69.
Alberta recovered sulfur still leaves mainly through the Vancouver stem. A 25 percent fourth-quarter FOB fade does not idle the harbour. VFPA still printed 3,103,912 tonnes of sulphur for the year, up 11 percent. Volume and price disconnected. Stems programmed on term offtake loaded while remelt tickets paused.
China's 2023 import recovery to 8.8 million tonnes, IndexBox, had already happened at lower value, about $1.1 billion. Waning Chinese demand into December is the winter pause inside a recovery year, not a 2022-style phosphate-export curb. Canada had supplied about 1.2 million tonnes into that Chinese book. Gulf origins still competed at freight-adjusted FOB.
Rising freight trimming FOB netbacks is the ocean cost sitting on a Pacific solid. Red Sea security concerns into late 2023 were already lengthening some Middle East-to-Asia voyages via the Cape. Canadian stems do not use Suez. They still pay Pacific dry-bulk. Higher ocean rates cut what is left for remelt, rail, forming, and terminal after FOB.
Export-process costs have often been cited above $150 per tonne. $72 FOB does not clear that hurdle. Argus reported that earlier in 2023 suppliers were remelting solid sulfur inventory to keep pace with exporter demand, before late-year price weakness squeezed high-cost remelt tonnes. December is that squeeze. Pour-to-block returns as the default for tonnes that cannot clear.
Alberta January-October production at 3.78 million tonnes, up 11 percent, AER via Argus, meant more recovery into a softer FOB. South Cheecham had started in the third quarter. Forming capacity existed. Netbacks did not. That is why 2024 opened quiet at $69 Tampa and still grew Vancouver tonnes. Logistics cleared. Remelt waited.
Figures follow the 14 December Argus viewpoint. Licensed weekly grids are not restated. The $72 midpoint is the Pacific print that set first-quarter 2024 Tampa expectations in that same item.