By John Richardson IT DIDN’T matter if there was any truth behind the stories people used to tell each other about the Chinese economy as it underwent an unprecedented period of growth in 2009-2014. All that mattered was that a lot of people were making a lot of money as petrochemicals and polymers sales volumes […]
Asian Chemical Connections
Prepare For A More Regionalised, Fragmented Polymers World
By John Richardson THE above map global shows our base-case forecasts for global trade flows of HDPE, LLDPE and PP in 2025. It is the result of lots of hard work and smart thinking around feedstock costs, logistics costs and demand growth etc. and is a good start to your scenario planning process. The map […]
US-China Trade War To Accelerate As Restrictions On US Petchem Exports Increase
By John Richardson TAKE a broader view of US-China trading relationship and the picture looks very different from the straightforward, headline big US deficit, as James Kynge points out in this important article in the FT. It is the presence of US companies in China that also matters. The most recent data, which is for […]
China Tariffs On US Petchem Feedstocks To Reshape Global Trade And Investment
By John Richardson CHINA’S planned tariffs against US petrochemical feedstock exports threaten a major upheaval of global trade flows in the feedstocks. The tariffs could also strengthen petrochemicals feedstock trading relationships between China and its fellow Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) country members. The Middle East may in particular step into the breach to supply […]
US-China Trade War Heavily Focused On Energy, Petchems
By John Richardson Normally, the blog only publishes on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, but this week is an exceptional week because of the unfolding US-China trade war. So today I publish a post with more to follow tomorrow. YESTERDAY it became apparent that the US-China trade war includes a large number of energy, petchems, polymers […]
China Holds Most Of The Good Cards In Trade War With US
By John Richardson THE BREAKOUT of formal trade hostilities between China and the US, after more than a year of a “war of words” between the two countries, has occurred shortly after the EU responded to the US aluminium and steel tariffs with tariffs of its own against US goods. The much-feared tit-for-tat exchange of […]
China to impose tariffs on PE, propane, PVC as global trade war begins
By John Richardson IT HAS happened. Don’t say you weren’t told, as I have been warning you to prepare for this since President Trump became president. The president’s decision to impose $50bn worth of tariffs on US imports from China has led to immediate retaliation from China. China has announced its own list of US […]
China Polyethylene Strong Q1 Growth Doesn’t Reflect Risks Ahead
By John Richardson CHINA’S Q1 2018 polypropylene (PP) imports were down by 20% year-on-year as apparent demand (net imports plus local production) rose by just 1% on the steep fall in the availability of lending. Meanwhile, overall polyethylene (PE) imports were up by 12% as apparent PE demand grew by 9%. Does this mean that […]
G7 Meeting And The Risks For US Polyethylene Producers
By John Richardson IN All the noise, confusion and economic anxiety following last weekend’s very acrimonious G7 meeting in Canada, you might have failed to notice one very significant detail for the polymers industry. This was the refusal by the US and Japan to sign a plastics charter put forward by Canadian Prime Minister, Justin […]
Petchems Markets To Become Entirely Regional As Trade Barriers Increase
By John Richardson WHEN Donald Trump held election rallies during 2016, the amount of anger directed at mainstream Democratic Party candidate Hillary Clinton was, as everyone knows, intense. She represented the kind of mainstream politician that many of those who voted for President Trump blamed for stagnating middle class income levels and the loss of […]