By John Richardson CHIINA’S ethylene equivalent imports will see zero growth over the next 5-7 years and the country’s propylene equivalent import requirement will decline over the same period, says a source with a major oil, gas and petrochemicals producer. This exceptionally bearish forecast is based on lower demand growth as China undergoes major economic […]
Asian Chemical Connections
It Is Just Too Difficult
Smart bottles By John Richardson THERE is a growing concern amongst some polyolefin industry executives that, despite the economic problems first in China and now India, there is still a great deal of enthusiasm for adding new capacity, as we discuss in this ICIS Insight article. “Now that China has weakened, everybody has switched […]
Indonesia’s Challenges
By John Richardson INDONESIA was the subject of much enthusiasm when the blog hosted a webinar on Monday on China Polyolefins Markets. We will provide a link to a recorded version of the event shortly. The reason for the enthusiasm over Indonesia is perhaps because China, and now quite likely India, no longer guarantee strong growth. […]
Africa’s Potential
By John Richardson AFRICA was described as “one of the last frontiers for the chemicals industry” by a delegate during last week’s 2nd World ICIS Polyolefins Conference in Berlin. The opportunity is certainly there with a population of around one billion people, and with six countries in the world’s top ten fastest-growth countries (See GDP […]
China’s SMEs Continue To Struggle
By John Richardson ONE of the reasons why China’s polyethylene (PE) demand growth has been below the increase in overall GDP for most of the years since 2006 has been the relatively weak performance of the country’s small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). As the state has advanced, the private sector has retreated because most of […]
We Told You So
By John Richardson POLYETHYLENE (PE) prices in China fell by $5-10/tonne for the week ending 1 March, according to ICIS pricing. “It is increasingly clear that Chinese growth will slow from the second quarter onwards and this will limit potential recovery for Asia,” say analysts at Credit Agricole. The Shanghai Composite Index dropped 3.7% on […]
Damage Limitation
By John Richardson POLYETHYLENE (PE) prices crept up by $10-50/tonne for the week ending 22 February, according to ICIS pricing. But, as the above chart shows, integrated high-density PE variable cost margins in Southeast and Northeast Asia remained very weak, and were way below all the other regions – again, up until the week ending […]
Filtering Out The Noise
By John Richardson ONE should be careful about reading too much into the above margins for February as, of course, there was very little trading activity because of Chinese New Year (CNY), whilst oil and therefore naphtha prices increased. But the poor performances in December and January in Southeast and Northeast Asia, despite the rally […]
Beware Of Excessive Optimism
By John Richardson CHEMICALS and polymer markets have enjoyed a very strong recovery in Asia since November/December, according to many of the traders we have spoken to. “We are getting $150-200/tonne more for benzene and toluene in January compared with early November. There has been a strong recovery in confidences,” said a Dubai-based trader. […]
Labour Supply After Chinese New Year
Chinese job seekers at a recruitment fair Imaginechina/Rex Features By John Richardson As petrochemicals markets begin to slow down ahead of the Chinese New Year, which this year falls on 10 February, a lot of attention is, as always, being focused on the likely strength of demand after the holidays. The hope is that […]
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