By John Richardson HAVE FEEDSTOCK will build has been the route to success for many years in the petrochemicals business. If you have never experienced anything else then a change in the paradigm is very hard to come to terms with. What often instead happens is that a new paradigm is simply rejected in favour […]
Asian Chemical Connections
President Trump can only cause major economic damage by beating China, unless he has a time machine
The views in this blog, are, as always, my own personal views and don’t reflect the views of ICIS. Thanks By John Richardson LORD SALISBURY, who served as British Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, understood it was impossible to turn back time to the American Civil of […]
Unsustainable boom in China auto market ends as sales of new vehicles move permanently lower
By John Richardson THERE IS a big temptation when making forecasts of becoming too excited about the recent past. Judgements are at risk of being blurred by euphoria, resulting in very bad investment decisions based on the notion that the recent past will reflect the long-term future. Paradigm shifts do occur from time to time. […]
China economic stimulus and PP: How global demand could have been 71m tonnes smaller
By John Richardson CHINA came to the rescue of the global economy in 2009. This wasn’t for altruistic reasons as a government study said that unless a huge stimulus programme was launched, 20m Chinese workers would return to the coastal cities from inland China after the Lunar New Year in 2009 without jobs. This would […]
Hong Kong an example of rising political risk and the end of easy growth
This blog expresses my opinions and not those of ICIS By John Ricuardson THE UNREST in Hong Kong worsened over the weekend. Protestors were pepper-sprayed, rubber bullets were used and travellers on the Hong Kong underground were filmed being beaten by the police. Petrol bombs were thrown by demonstrators. This morning Hong Kong’s airport was […]
US declaring China currency manipulator risks 10.8m tonnes of global petrochemicals demand
By John Richardson BY PLAYING with fire President Trump has very likely set the forest on fire. Today’s decision by the White House decision to declare China a currency manipulator makes a global recession even more likely than it was yesterday, when I discussed the negative economic results of the president’s plan to levy […]
Trump latest tariffs risk global recession, 3.8m tonne lost PE demand
By John Richardson PRESIDENT Trump is playing with fire as a result of his plan to impose 10% import tariffs on a further $300bn of Chinese imports. This threatens to push the world into a global recession. (I hope you took notice when I warned you to expect very little from last week’s trade talks). […]
President Trump’s Vietnam warning threatens more polyethylene disruptions
Just to stress that, as always, what follows are my own personal views and not those of ICIS By John Richardson DON’T say I didn’t warn you. Three weeks ago I said that Vietnam could well be dragged into the trade war. “A lot of companies are moving to Vietnam, but Vietnam takes advantage of […]
China PP demand at risk of 20 million tonnes shortfall in 2019-2025
By John Richardson THE CHANCES of some kind of trade deal have edged a little higher following the announcement that President Trump will have an extended meeting with President Xi at the G20 meeting in Japan later this month. They will not just pass each other in the corridor and shake hands during a group […]
China real estate a growing stress point for global chemicals demand
By John Richardson WE ALL know, or at least we all should know, just how important is the Chinese economy to the global economy. Assume significantly weaker-than-consensus Chinese demand growth in everything from base chemicals to autos, smartphones and TVs, and there is no statistical basis for believing that strong growth in other regions can […]