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Asian Chemical Connections

Taiwan’s tough talk

By Malini Hariharan Formosa Petrochemical Corp’s problems are mounting after two accidents in less than a month at its refinery and petrochemical site in Mailiao, Taiwan. Wu Den-yih, the country’s premier was at the site last week and ordered an investigation report to be submitted on 6 August. And in a bid to reassure residents […]

China PE Price Rebound Driven By Futures Market

By John Richardson CHINA’S domestic linear-low density polyethylene (LLDPE) prices have rebounded by as much as Yuan 1,000/tonne ($147.5./tonne) or 8% over the last two weeks, according to this ICIS news article from my colleague Rainy Ma. As these graphs show (click below) there is now a significant gap between more expensive domestic material and […]

Singapore’s New Petrochemicals Strategy

Singapore’s Marina Bay Sands complex   Source of picture: Washington Pos     By John Richardson “SUCCESS in this business, whether you are tracking price direction or planning new investments, is 95% about feedstock,” says a senior European-based sales manager with a global polyolefin producer. So perhaps it shouldn’t be a great surprise that a […]

Asian Polyolefins – A Dead Cat Bounce

    Source of picture: anirudhsethireport.com By John Richardson WE reported earlier this week that cautious confidence is being expressed that the worst might be over in polyolefin markets with prices having reached the bottom. “The market seems to be improving and my view there is no much room for further price corrections from a […]

Singapore Confirms Plans For 6-8m tonne/year Ethylene

Jurong Island Source of picture: www.pcs.com.sg   By John Richardson SINGAPORE plans to eventually raise its ethylene capacity to 6-8m tonne/year from the 4m tonne/year which will be reached when ExxonMobil’s second cracker complex at Jurong Island is on-stream, Liang Ting Wee, Director of Energy and Chemicals at the Economic Development Board (EDB), has told […]

Managing expectations

By Malini Hariharan A spurt in Chinese buying enquiries in the last few days has awakened hopes in some quarters of an upturn in polyolefin pricing with one trader predicting a $50-70/tonne rise in the coming weeks. The prediction, he says, is based on his experience with the commodity cycle – as buyers in China […]

China PE, PP Production Up By 30%

By John Richardson and Malini Hariharan CHINA’S polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) production surged in January-June this year as imports remained strong and demand growth declined, according to the Shanghai-based commodity information service, CBI. Hopes being expressed that pricing might have bottomed-out therefore seem a tad premature – especially as Asian cracking operating rates are […]

Searching for balance

By John Richardson and Malini Hariharan Cautious optimism first gave way to mounting anxiety over the prospects for the second half of this year, but now the mood surrounding China’s polyolefins market is downright pessimistic. “It is going to take a few months to clear up polyolefin inventories and volumes from new plants,” Mazlan Razak, […]

Honam plans Titan expansion

By Malini Hariharan News is trickling in on Honam Petrochemical‘s plans for Titan Chemicals once it completes the acquisition at the end of the year. A source close to the company said that revamping of Titan’s two crackers have been evaluated including expansion of derivatives and building new downstream units at Titan’s Pasir Gudang complex […]

Propylene And the Law Of Unintended Consequences

Will this year’s K-Fair see some major announcements to take advantage of the relative fall in ethylene costs? Source of picture; http://www.k-online.de/   By John Richardson THE rise in the price of propylene relative to ethylene is exercising the minds of senior executives in the polypropylene (PP) industry. As fellow blogger Paul Hodges highlighted earlier […]

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