Confidence along all the chemicals value chains is always a key issue because of the ability to aggressively manage inventories, according to the London-based chemicals analyst Paul Satchell. So there’s the ever-present risk of sudden and very disruptive de-stocking. The longer the current rallies in commodity prices and stock markets continue, the greater might be […]
Asian Chemical Connections
PTA futures growing in influence?
Source of picture: 1st-commoditytrading.us It’s only one comment from one consultant, but this is what he said today about the growing role of the Zhenghou Commodity Exchange‘s purified terephthalic acid (PTA) futures contract. “PTA futures have been exerting a huge impact on spot pricing starting 2H July. “We haven’t seen any increase in physical demand […]
Dalian: A Whole New Ball Game?
Source of picture: waittilnextcentury.blogspot Back to an old theme, the Dalian Commodity Exchange, this story from ICIS news talks of how physical cargoes are being bought and then sold at a price fixed now for November delivery. At the time of writing this was realising a $169/tonne profit. This could be old news, but I […]
China inventory sentiment survey
Peering through the fog On the theme of data again, in the ideal world it might be possible to send thousands of hardworking foot solders out into the field in China to chase down every warehouse of polymers and count every single pallet of polyolefins. Not not really – don’t talk nonsense; in reality, this […]
Is Dalian setting the markets?
Make your own mind up about the role of the Dalian Commodity Exchange linear-low density polyethylene (LLDPE) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) futures contracts from the interviews below. The first quote is from Sinopec – from an ICIS news story. There then follows my interviews with a major Asian producer and a consultant based in Asia. […]
The insidious rise of the Internet….
“Bob, I think I we should give this up as I can’t get a wireless connection and I couldn’t be bothered to talk to anyone.” Source of Picture: Faculty.SMU.Edu . ……and the effect on the quality of data and analysis is one of my big concerns – particularly at a time like this when petrochemical […]
China’s Great Property Gamble
Source of Picture: Chinasnippets.com Perhaps this post will help explain why a perplexed Hong Kong-based financial analyst wrote to me the other day, in response to my probably failed efforts to adequately explain rising chemicals demand in China: “I stilll don’t understand why polymer imports from PP, PE, PVC, and even SM (+15% per month […]
Credit Expansion Linked To Dalian Boom?
Source of Picture: http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/ We have just started doing our research and so more details later – but see attached this Excel spreadsheet – lendingVDalianOI.xls It compares the increase in lending from China’s banks with the amount of open interest in the Dalian Commodity Exchange’s linear-low density polyethylene (LLDPE) futures contracts. Volume traded on the […]
Dalian LLDPE futures explained?
My last blog entry quoted a North American industry source who was concerned over the potential for physical delivery on the Dalian futures exchange to flood the real market and send prices crashing. In my ignorance of how futures markets works, and as a typicaql semi-numerate journalist, I therefore asked a colleague with a futures/mathematical […]
Artificial price support about to disappear
Source of picture: gilesbowkett.blogspot.com The excellent daily energy and shipping report, The Schork Report said today that the bottom had “fallen out of the entire (energy) complex.” With the Bulls on the defensive, the authors believe that crude could retreat towards $60/bbl. Natural gas markets are so oversupplied that prices in the region of $2/mBTU […]
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