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Asian Chemical Connections

China Copper, Chemicals And The Interconnections

By John Richardson IT is the interconnections that matter and the trouble is that few people seem to have adequately thought about the interconnections between the various dysfunctional parts of the Chinese economy. For example; A lot of the main players in copper financing are also involved in the property market, according to this FT […]

China Housing No Longer A One-Way Bet

By John Richardson CHINA’s real estate sector was responsible for 16% of the country’s GDP growth, 33% of fixed asset investment, 20% of outstanding loans, 26% of new loans, and contributed 39% to government revenues in 2013, according to Nomura. And so the potential downside to chemicals demand from a correction in the property sector […]

China’s Urbanisation Myth Bites The Dust

By John Richardson THE blog would again be in the position of being able to afford a yacht in Monte Carlo if it had a dollar, even in an Australian dollar these days, for every time it has heard the phrase “urbanisation will underpin long-term growth in China”. But just as  some of the other […]

China And The “Conflation” Problem

By John Richardson WHEN all you care about is making money on the next chemicals cargo, or on a recovery in financial markets, then the current “will they, won’t they?” question over whether China will launch a new round of economic stimulus makes every bit of sense. The debate grew more intense on Monday after […]

Take Away The China “Froth” And What’s Left?

By John Richardson THE denial that we discussed last week is still very much in evidence. For example, we heard the argument over the last few days that China’s economic slowdown would involve only “a couple of bad quarters” and then China, and Asia-Pacific markets in general, would be back to normal. The following two […]

India Can Be Plastic Fantastic

By John Richardson THE blog has recently heard India described as “very disappointing” by several overseas executives of major polyolefins producers. When pressed about what they meant, they told us: Economic growth over the last few years has been much weaker than expected. This has been the result of infrastructure constraints and lack of foreign […]

What Comes After Shale Gas

By John Richardson IF the blog had a dollar for every occasion it had heard the phrase “ the shale gas revolution” over the last five years, we would be sitting on the deck of our yacht in Monte Carlo harbour right now, pondering the dilemma of when would be a good time for us […]

Confusion, Muddle, Denial And Sheer Panic

By John Richardson CHINA’S polyethylene (PE) demand grew by grew by 70% in 2008-2013 compared with 11% in 2005-2008, according to Chinese local production data and import data supplied by Global Trade Information Services. Whilst this growth was taking place, few people asked too many hard questions about whether this was sustainable, given that the […]

China Jobs Versus The Cost Curve

By John Richardson ACHIEVING approval for any new petrochemicals projects in China is going to be a lot harder in the future, is a a growing view across the chemicals industry. A senior executive with a US-based polyolefins producer, for example, told the blog recently:  “It looks as if Chinese chemicals companies are finding it […]

Nothing “Disappointing” About China Data

By John Richardson CHINA’S credit growth in 2014 would have to be higher than that of last year if GDP growth is going to hit 7.5%. But in February, as Reuters wrote in this article: “China’s total social financing, a broad measure of credit in the economy, increased by 938.7 billion Yuan ($US152.9bn) in February, […]

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