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Asian Chemical Connections

Indonesia: Seize The Day

By John Richardson IT WAS criminally wrong. Yes, criminally wrong. Financial speculators drove up the price oil to $100 a barrel and more, which forced developing countries to waste many billions of dollars on fuel subsidies. This was money that should and could have been spent on better infrastructure, education, healthcare and sanitation. The irony […]

Oil Markets In One Word: China

By John Richardson A COMMENT I have heard so many times over the last two months is that once oil prices settle down, China’s petrochemicals buyers will have to come back in large numbers in order to replenish what must be, by now, very low inventory levels. For example, last month I was told: “If […]

US Petrochemicals: Three Predictions For 2015

By John Richardson AS you can see from the table below, there are  no less than 12 US ethane-based cracker projects being planned with lots of associated downstream capacity. Theoretically, this represents: 14.8m tonnes/year of new ethylene capacity at these 12 proposed facilities. There are also eight planned expansions of existing plants, adding up to […]

China Polyethylene: Three Predictions For 2015

By John Richardson THE  chart  below serves as an excellent illustration of the big shift in consensus thinking about China’s overall economy, as it shows that: PE imports surged in January on the belief that China would “blink” – and they remained, on the whole, strong until October. The resilience in imports persisted despite evidence […]

So Much For The Bonus From Cheaper Oil

By John Richardson THE big turning point in Asian petrochemicals markets can be traced back to around the end of July for three big reasons: • It was broadly accepted from then onwards that China wasn’t going to change its policies. There would be no “blinking” via a big, old-style economic stimulus package. • The […]

US Petrochemicals Will Suffer From “The Blame Game”

  By John Richardson THE chat below provides some very instructive reading as it shows that: Since 2000, overall real consumption in US polyethylene (PE) has fallen from around 12.5m tonnes to 12.3m tonnes (real consumption is domestic production plus imports, and then minus exports, with end-year adjustments made for any inventory distortions). Low-density PE […]

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