Northwest European styrene monomer barges loading 5-30 days forward stand at $1,373.50/mt FOB ARA, while Asian prices stand at $1,264.50/mt FOB Korea and $1,288.50/mt CFR China. 

In May a bullish Asian styrene market drew imports from other regions, leaving only 20,000-25,000 mt of imports expected in the ARA region for June. 

This falls short of the typical flows into Europe in a balanced market. 

"With Asia taking the lion's share of US imports this month, Europe is set to see more flows next month. There is material around, but it is an issue of logistics and timing," a consumer source said. 

Imports into the EU-28 during the first quarter totaled 173,768 mt or an average of 57,923 mt/month, Eurostat data showed. 

The bulk of the volume came from Saudi Arabia, Russia and the US. These three countries exported 84,124 mt of styrene in Q1, or almost half the total. 

Market participants expected fewer imports from the Middle East on the back of outages at styrene units in the region leaving US material to satisfy European spot demand. These outages include Chevron Phillips' 777,000 mt/year plant and Sadaf's 600,000 mt/year No. 2 plant, both in Jubail, Saudi Arabia. 

At current prices Europe has become a more attractive destination than Asia for US exports where prices stand at 57.50 cents/gal ($1,267/mt) FOB USG. 

Asian prices have plunged over the last few weeks as South Korean plants have restarted from maintenance that shut as much as 76% of the country's production capacity over March-May, and prices are expected to continue this downward trend in the coming weeks. 

Freight from the USG to Europe is $43/mt and freight to Far-East Asia is $59/mt, which puts European styrene $125/mt above Chinese prices on an import parity basis from the US, Platts data showed.