By John Richardson IT is worth comparing what is happening in China today with what is happening in the EU. First of all, in China we are seeing: A political leadership that has been honest enough to admit that China got it wrong in the past. This has led to a new economic and social […]
Asian Chemical Connections
New Silk Road Part 2: How China Will Win
Here is the second part of my thinking on what China’s New Silk Road means for the global chemicals industry. Part One appeared last Thursday. By John Richardson PER capital GDP in Yunnan province in China’s southwest was just Yuan 25,083 ($4,050) in 2014, which made it the 29th poorest of the country’s 31 […]
Oil Prices: Did You Heed All The Warnings?
By John Richardson THE $30 a barrel price of crude at or below which some Asian naphtha cracker operators could be forced to exit the business is an increasing possibility. Here is why: This January’s stockpile of crude in the US is the highest for more than 80 years, said the US-based Energy Information Administration […]
China Would Be The Only Winner From A Price War
By John Richardson IT IS dangerously wrong to still think of China as just a cheap, copycat low-value manufacturing nation. Yes, cheap, agreed, and to begin with, as was the case with the US, it has copied other countries’ technologies. But forget low value, as China’s extraordinary growth in the smartphones business indicates. Eventually in […]
Asian Polyethylene: Inventory Losses Threaten Survival
By John Richardson HERE are some observations, from several discussions with market participants this week, about what is happening in China’s key polyethylene (PE) market: If the oil price stays at $40-50 a barrel then payment collection from local customers, who kept going into the market to buy resin when they thought the crude market […]
Chemical Sales, Capital Spending In A Weaker Oil-Price World
By John Richardson THE above chart shows the top 23 of the latest ICIS Top 100 ranking of global chemicals companies by sales in US dollars for 2013. When the 2014 numbers have been fully compiled and released later this year, some targets sales growth might well be missed. “We never imagined that the oil […]
How To Get Through 2015 In One Piece (More Or Less)
By John Richardson EVERY time the oil price stabilises for just a few days there is pretty widespread talk of the market having found a bottom and that a rebound is about to begin. A case in point was last week, when, before the oil price fell below $50 a barrel, two days of relative […]
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 […]
Europe: Three Very Easy Predictions For 2015
By John Richardson HERE are some alarming facts about Europe: If you include all the people who have become disheartened and so have dropped out of the labour force, the Spanish employment rate fell from 66% in 2007 to just 56% in 2014. In Greece, employment has fallen to below 50% since 2007. “Chancellor Angela […]
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 […]
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