MTBE: Trading

Spot cargoes priced against petrol benchmarks

What this tab covers How it is bought and sold: buyers and sellers, price benchmarks and who publishes them, exchanges, contract types, traders, how Indian buyers price it, recent price points, and good sources to follow.

Who buys, and where

Mexico's Pemex and petrol importers
Singapore blending hub
European refiners and blenders (ARA)
Latin American and African petrol importers

Who sells, and from where

US Gulf Coast exporters
Saudi Arabia and other Gulf producers
Chinese exporters
Malaysia and Singapore producers (indicative)

Price benchmarks

Benchmark	Publisher	Basis
MTBE FOB China	S&P Global Platts	spot
MTBE FOB Singapore	Platts, Argus	spot, daily
MTBE FOB Rotterdam barges	Platts, Argus	spot, priced as a factor to Eurobob
MTBE US Gulf Coast	Platts, Argus, OPIS	spot, cents per gallon

Exchanges

Venue	Contract	Notes
None liquid	OTC swaps against Platts assessments (indicative)	most trade is physical

Contract types

Spot cargoes priced as a factor or premium to petrol benchmarks
Term supply to refiners and blenders

Traders and distributors

Oil majors' trading arms and independent oil traders (indicative)

How Indian buyers price it

Indian refiners produce and blend MTBE internally; transfer pricing is at petrol-linked import parity (indicative)
Methanol for MTBE is bought at CFR India import parity

Recent price points

Date	Price	Basis	Source
Sep-Nov 2025	$620-640/t	FOB China	S&P Global Platts (via H1 2026 trends)
Sep-Nov 2024	$665-725/t	FOB China	S&P Global Platts (via H1 2026 trends)

Good sources to follow

Energy Aspects MTBE insightfreemium research site · Energy Aspects

MTBE supply-demand and trade

S&P Global Commodity Insights chemical trendsfreemium research site · S&P Global

half-yearly MTBE and aromatics trade outlook

Methanol Institutefree research site · industry association

methanol prices and demand, incl. MTBE share