The State Trading Corporation (STC) of India failed to get prices matching the ETA offer of $390.97/mt CFR in the urea tender that closed last week. The ETA offer for 25,000-30,000 mt was more than $10/mt off the average price of $402/mt CFR from the rest of the companies offering tons.
Industry sources speculated before the tender closed that STC would try to take as close to 1 million mt as possible and that prices would be in the low $400s/mt CFR. The ETA offer, which was way off the consensus of where the market was, killed any chance of a large purchase.
When the tender closed, STC approached the rest of the offering companies asking them to match a schedule of prices for different ports based on the ETA offer. Even though the initial response from most of the companies was to reject the bid, STC waited until today to close the door on its counter bid.
India is still about 3 million mt short of urea for its urea needs this year. Another tender will most likely be called soon.