Japan’s JERA is lowest bidder in Bangladesh LNG spot tender at $16.50/MMBtu

Japanese energy company JERA has offered the lowest price of $16.50/MMBtu for one LNG cargo into Bangladesh’s latest spot tender for a March 11-12 delivery to the Moheshkhali floating storage and regasification unit, a senior Petrobangla official told S&P Global Commodity Insights Feb. 14.

The tender closed Feb. 12 and JERA is set to deliver its first LNG cargo to Bangladesh, supplying around 3.36 million MMBtu, the official said.

Six other LNG suppliers including Vitol Asia, Gunvor Singapore, Excelerate Energy and TotalEnergies also submitted bids in the tender that was issued a week ago, with the highest offer at around $21/MMBtu, the official said.

Bangladesh’s cabinet committee on government purchases is set to approve awarding the LNG supply deal to JERA during a meeting scheduled for later this week, the official added.

State-owned Rupantarita Prakritik Gas Company Ltd, or RPGCL, a fully-owned subsidiary of Petrobangla, the national oil company that looks after LNG trades for Bangladesh, will issue another tender by next week to import a similar sized LNG spot cargo in late March, the official said.

Bangladesh is set to receive its first spot LNG cargo for 2023 over Feb. 21-22 from TotalEnergies at the Moheshkhali FSRU, which was awarded at $19.78/MMBtu in a bidding round in which the highest bid received was around $24/MMBtu.

The country is expected to continue importing LNG from the spot market in coming months as spot prices trend lower due to healthy inventories and tepid winter demand in most regions.

Platts assessed the JKM for March delivery at $15.40/MMBtu Feb. 13, the lowest since Aug. 20, 2021, S&P Global data showed.
Source: Platts