IT ALL CHAOS AND MUDDLE out there: China’s ethylene glycols demand could either grow by 10% in 2023 or contract by 5%.
Asian Chemical Connections
China’s petchems market rally: we don’t have enough data to decide whether it is sustainable
By John Richardson CHINA’S PETROCHEMICAL prices typically increase when the Lunar New Year (LNY) holidays come to an end. But because some of China’s factories either did not shut down at all this year or staggered their closures to control the country’s limited second wave of the pandemic, this week’s price rally might have not […]
Exporters of PP and SM to China seem to have options other than shutdowns, but not PX exporters
By John Richardson DIFFICULT choices lie ahead for exporters of polypropylene (PP), styrene monomer (SM) and paraxylene (PX) to China. From next year onwards, the country’s imports will start to decline and by 2023-2025 complete self-sufficiency may be reached in all these products. Just how significant this shift will be for global markets, we can […]
Ah, I see: China’s booming demand mystery a little closer to being solved
Note that all the data comparisons below are on a year-on-year basis By John Richardson THE PROVERBIAL light bulb came on early last month, thanks to this article from Trade Data Monitor (TDM) which analysed China’s strong July exports and made the point that they were driven by a big change in lifestyles. Many […]
The China polyester mystery continues in a world turned upside down
By John Richardson SOMETHING very strange is happening in China’s polyester industry which has enormous implications for the global industry, as ICIS data continue to point towards strong local apparent demand growth for paraxylene (PX) and monoethylene glycols (MEG) despite seemingly weak downstream fundamentals. The world “enormous” is no hyperbole because China completely dominates exports […]
China’s big declines in 2020 PX and PP imports: the impact on its major trading partners
By John Richardson CHINA’S refineries and petrochemicals plants came roaring back to almost full production in April as the country’s coronavirus lockdown came to an end, even though downstream manufacturing was a long way from full recovery. As of last week, I was told by my contacts in China that petrochemicals and polymers buyers were […]
Coronavirus: China ethylene glycols demand could fall by 1.2m tonnes as imports also diminish
By John Richardson IN GEORGE ORWELL’S magnificent parody of communism, Animal Farm, he writes; “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others’”. So it goes in petrochemicals value chains. All the chains have been affected by the coronavirus outbreak. They all share the commonality of a big loss over at least […]
Symptoms worsen for Dr Benzene and China economy as trade war accelerates
By John Richardson THE ABOVE chart is again telling us something very important about the real state of the Chinese economy. It shows Northeast Asian (NEA) benzene pricing spreads over naphtha feedstock costs, (NEA pricing is in effect a China price as of course China dominates the NEA region). Dr Benzene, as with Dr Copper, […]
Vietnam PE demand booms on trade war, but for how much longer?
By John Richardson GLOBAL manufacturing supply chains are adjusting to the US tariffs against China, accelerating a process that began a decade or so ago because of China’s ageing population versus more youthful populations elsewhere. Let’s use Vietnam as an example to first of all examine the longer term drift away from China. Since 2010, […]
China purified terephthalic net exports to reach 2.7m tonnes by 2025
By John Richardson LET’S START with the good news first. ICIS Data and Analytics had expected China’s demand for paraxylene (PX) to grow by in 2018 at 5.6% over 2017, but instead I estimate growth at 9.2%. This was awesome news for the world’s major PX producers as the reason for the strong growth was […]