By John Richardson THE cosy relationship between the state-run banks and state-owned enterprises (SOEs) has long held back economic rebalancing, but wasn’t a critical problem for small-and-medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) when official lending tripled in 2009 (have a look at the chart on polypropylene in this post, which illustrates the impact). There was, of course, plenty of […]
Asian Chemical Connections
China’s SMEs Face New Lending Problem
By John Richardson CHINA’S small and medium-sized (SMEs) may already be finding it increasingly difficult to source trade finance as a result of the late June credit crackdown warned Winnie Wu, Hong Kong-based research analyst at Merrill Lynch, who was quoted in this article in The Economist. “A tightening of reckless credit is necessary in […]
China Govt Confirms Post-CNY Labour Shortages
The great news behind rising labour costs: Shan Dalin, pictured with his family, is a crane operator from Southwest China’s Guizhou province who has worked in eastern Zhejiang province for 10 years. In 2012, Shan’s monthly income rose to 2,800 yuan ($449) from lower than 2,000 yuan in 2008. [Photo/Xinhua] By John Richardson The […]
China PE Demand Down 3 Percent
By John Richardson GROUND level economic conditions in China are still a lot weaker than headline GDP (gross domestic product) numbers suggest. For example, a polyvinyl chloride (PVC) sales and marketing executive said: “PVC demand growth is going to be in minus territory this year. Carbide-based producers are likely to continue to have to run […]
The Edginess, The Nervousness Continues
By John Richardson THE edgy and nervous nature of the recovery in Asian polyolefin markets became even more apparent from discussions the blog held with traders and producers during a visit to Singapore last week. Such was the uncertainty that there were mid-week reports of falls in pricing. By Friday, though, one producer told us […]
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