The blog is taking a break for the festive season (we will back on Thursday next week before, of course, closing-down again over the New Year period). We would like to wish all of our readers a very happy holiday season and successful 2012. Before we take our leave, here are a few thoughts […]
Asian Chemical Connections
The Risks For US Petchems
By John Richardson THE US petrochemicals industry might be in danger of being lured into old thinking about the future direction of the global economy as a result of abundant shale gas. Despite the short-term markets gloom which we described yesterday, several industry executives and observers who we spoke to on the sidelines of […]
The Risks Of Being An Outlier
By John Richardson THE blog has been mystified throughout this year over why senior industry executives appear to remain “in denial” over the weakness of global petrochemicals markets. Time and again we have heard the comment that the falls in demand were only the result of de-stocking. The public mood of the industry has soured […]
The Murkiest Of Outlooks
By John Richardson LACK OF visibility over what the New Year will bring for the global chemicals industry is a key feature of just about every conversation held with industry executives at the moment. Perfect forecasting is, of course, always impossible, but with the Eurozone in deep crisis and even China potentially facing its own bad-debt crisis, […]
China And The WTO Ten Years On
By John Richardson TEN years ago this weekend China officially joined the World Trade Organisation (WTO), and so no doubt numerous speeches have been given about all the benefits to the global economy. Here is a somewhat more negative perspective: *As the diagram above seeks to illustrate, China hugely built-up its manufacturing industry to take advantage of Western […]
Relief Rallies Will Not Be Sustained
By John Richardson FURTHER relief rallies in petrochemical markets that occur over the next few weeks and months will not change the overall direction. Buyers will inevitably run short of stocks down all the value chains and we thus will see some more brief flurries of price rises. Another driver of inventory rebuilding will be recoveries […]
US Chemicals See End Of Profit Boost
By John Richardson THE extent to which the US economy has become distorted in favour of the corporate sector was thrown into sharp relief by this article in the New York Times (the financial sector is another separate, but equally disturbing story). Whether the US can tackle the longer-term factors behind the distortions in favour […]
Investment Theories Don’t Need To Be True
By John Richardson DEVELOPED market plastics demand is currently 15 per cent below 2007 levels, despite a modest recovery in 2010, because of two successive years of double-digit declines in 2008 and 2009, according to a new HSBC report. Some estimates suggest that developed-market demand will return to pre-crisis levels by 2015, adds HSBC. However, the […]
Babyboomers Change The Markets
Consumption dominates chemical demand. Chapter 7 of our new ‘Boom, Gloom and the New Normal’ eBook therefore looks at the changes taking place in consumer markets. These provide vital insight into how chemical markets are likely to develop in the New Normal. The key learning is that companies are re-adapting their business models. The great […]
China’s Debt Problems
By John Richardson Fellow blogger Paul Hodges made a convincing case in a post on Tuesday that China’s economic model faces some major challengs. “It seems increasingly clear that China‘s economic policy took a wrong turn 10 years ago, when it joined the World Trade Organisation,” wrote Hodges. From 2001 onwards, China transformed itself into the […]
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