By John Richardson FORECASTING the absolute future price of any petrochemical has always been difficult and if you are ever exactly right this will be down more to good luck than good judgement. And the problem is that when you have been right once, and you make a big song and dance about it, everyone […]
Asian Chemical Connections
China PP Exports Jump 38% On Jobs Drive
Polyolefins markets in Asia are not behaving in the way that they used to behave. For value-added analysis of these changes, and for price and margin forecasts for the region, contact john.richardson@icis.com for details of how to subscribe to our Asian Polypropylene and Asian Polyethylene forecast reports. By John Richardson NOT everything in […]
It’s Insane But Why Not? Oil Back at $100 By Christmas
By John Richardson ALBERT Einstein is widely credited with saying this: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results”. Who cares if it is either paraphrased or he didn’t even say it at all? This is a fantastic quote. For me, what makes this quote so […]
Why The China “Higher Base” Argument Doesn’t Stand Up
By John Richardson WHAT an amazing success story. The above chart shows that: China’s high-density polyethylene demand rose by 151% between 2000 and 2014 to end up at around 10 million tonnes. Low-density PE consumption surged by 72% to approximately 4 million tonnes. And linear-low density PE was up by 133%, ending up at 8 […]
US Petchems: Last Piece Of Expansion Logic Fades On Falling Crude
By John Richardson THE demand was simply never going to be there to support anywhere close to the number of US cracker and derivatives projects listed in the table above. There long been two reasons for this: The US is a mature market with no demand growth since 2000 in ethylene and the biggest-volume derivative […]
US “Swimming In Ethylene” As Global Polyethylene Problems Build
If you are interested in my take on Asian polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) prices and margins going forward 12 months, then contact me at this email address – john.richardson@icis.com. I will then provide you with details on how to subscribe to our Asia PE and PP Forecast Reports. By John Richardson IT was […]
Global Polyethylene: The Bubble Continues To Burst
By John Richardson THERE are further reasons to believe that the bubble continues to burst for much of the global polyethylene (PE) industry, after what has been a misleadingly strong first half of the year. US ethylene capacity and production are on the increase as production issues lessen and as the US prepares to also […]
Asian Polypropylene: The Recent Past And Immediate Future
If you are interested in my take on Asian polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) prices and margins going forward 12 months, then contact me at this email address – john.richardson@icis.com. I can then provide you with details on how to subscribe to our Asia PE and PP Forecast Reports. By John Richardson AS with the […]
Asia Polyethylene: Explaining The Past And Future
By John Richardson TAKE a look at the above chart and ask yourself this question, “Why is it that the spreads between high-density polyethylene (HDPE) injection grade and naphtha have been so good so far this year?” The same has therefore, of course, applied to margins for integrated PE producers. Let’s first of all look […]
Margin Upswings Will Be Shorter And Shorter
By John Richardson A GOOD chart can quite often by worth many thousands of words with the above chart serving as an excellent example. You can see how in June, scheduled and unscheduled shutdowns of Asia-Pacific ethylene capacity exceeded 6.3m tonnes – the biggest total by far since at least 2011. Markets have been further […]
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