By John Richardson IF YOU only read the financial press and follow the stock markets you can be entirely forgiven for thinking that China’s economy has turned around as a result of huge injection of economic stimulus. But anyone whose job it is to follow petrochemicals markets should know that the jury is still out […]
Asian Chemical Connections
Weak China polypropylene demand in January-April indicates no big new economic stimulus
By John Richardson THE ABOVE chart should give you pause for thought if you believe that the Chinese economy is already recovering as a result of major new economic stimulus. This once again points to the value of chemicals and polymers as leading indicators of economic activity. A recovery might be around the corner thanks […]
The squeezed middle class and the threat to free trade
By John Richardson IF THE US had the same income distribution it had in 1979, the bottom 80% of the population would have $1 trillion -or $11,000 per family – more. The top 1% $1 trillion – $750,000 tonnes – less, according to this FT article by Lawrence Summers. From a dollars and cents perspective […]
China chemicals storage at bursting point indicates no big new economic stimulus
By John Richardson CHEMICALS markets are a great barometer for weather conditions in the wider economy because they are upstream of so many manufacturing industries. We should therefore take close notice of the above chart, from this excellent article by my ICIS colleague, Yvonne Shi. What the chart shows is that by mid-March, weekly inventory […]
China’s vital internet economy cannot be sacrificed for trade deal
By John Richardson THE latest stumbling block for the US/China trade talks is the Chinese reluctance to open up its market to foreign cloud computing companies, curb requirements for companies to store data locally and loosen restrictions on the transfer of data overseas. Many people’s first reaction will be that this is all about the […]
Growth in China second hand car market driven by ageing population
By John Richardson CHINA will become a country of a billion plus Western-style middle class consumers is what many people have been telling us for many years. Its unstoppable economic rise involves hundreds of millions more Chinese rising out of poverty as the economic boom moves steadily westwards into its poorer regions, is the popular […]
US LLDPE imports threaten to overwhelm European market
By John Richardson THE above chart may end up being an underestimate of the extent to which US linear-low density polyethylene (LLDPE) gains further market share in Europe. But this chart is by itself bad enough. Here’s my logic behind the above chart. thanks to numbers from our our excellent ICIS Supply & Demand Database: […]
Risks for US petrochemicals once again rise as trade war takes another twist
By John Richardson JUST when nearly of all us (including me) thought that a trade deal was about to happen, US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer has thrown quite a large spanner in the works. “I can’t predict success at this point, but we’re working hard and we have made real progress,” he told a Senate […]
US foreign policy reshaping global oil markets at major cost to the US
Guest blogger today is again Ajay Parmar in the third of his posts. He is a chemical engineering professional with 5 years of industrial experience in oil refining, primarily in a process engineering capacity. He joined ICIS in 2018 as a Senior Analyst and currently works on developing a price forecasting model for crude oil and […]
China’s January credit surge: Case for one-off panic, no new global economic boom
By John Richardson CHINA’S HUGE January credit increase might be the start of a new round of major credit-fuelled economic stimulus, was the theory I put forward last week. This would lead to a rebound in global growth and a surge in worldwide chemicals demand as global growth is about these three things: China, China […]