By John Richardson A MISCALCULATION by the White House could be one of several reasons why the US/China trade war continues throughout 2019 – and possibly even beyond that. This is the idea that China is losing the trade war and so will soon be forced to the negotiating table with compromises that meet American […]
Asian Chemical Connections
Chinese PE Tariffs Come Into Effect: The Impact On The Global Business
By John Richardson CHINA’S 25% import tariffs on all grades of US high-density polyethylene (HDPE) and 93% of the grades of linear-low density (LLDPE), which came into effect yesterday, look set to cause major damage to the global PE business. One of the biggest casualties could be the earnings of US PE producers. We shouldn’t […]
China Innovation Success Versus Failure: Electric Vehicles As Case Study
By John Richardson WHAT is the best route to innovation? Pure capitalism with a minimum amount of state interference or state-led investment programmes? The answer is likely to of course vary sector by sector. In some industrial sectors, the capitalist approach will work and in others, heavy state involvement will be more effective. A hybrid […]
China Overlooked Lending Data Down 64% As Economic Slowdown Continues
By John Richardson FAR too little attention is still being paid to China’s lending data even though this has long been the key measure of whether its economy is accelerating or slowing down. In January 2014, lending in China started to slow down as China’s recently appointed president, Xi Jinping, exerted his authority. At that […]
US-China Trade Dispute: Pause For Breath Does Not Mean End In Sight
By John Richardson Confused? You might well be if you’ve read the news reports following the US-China trade meeting in Washington last week. The immediate threat of a trade war looks as if it has been averted. China’s top envoy at the trade talks, Liu He, said that both sides had agreed for the time […]
China Emerges As Winner In New Multipolar World
By John Richardson TODAY’S headline should be written on your petrochemicals company boardroom wall, in several inch-high capital letters, and should then be used as the basis for a deep discussion about the consequences of this outcome for your business. You should then build scenarios around how this would change investment strategies and trade flows. […]
Plastic Waste Crisis: How Polymer Company Early Adopters Can Win
Being an “early adopter” is never easy because of cynicism and scepticism. But what choice do we polymer companies have? None, if they really want to protect their revenues. By John Richardson POLYMER companies will lose billions of euros and dollars in revenue unless they react in the right way to the global plastics […]
Plastic Waste: The Billion Dollar Threat To The Global Polymers Business
By John Richardson THE global scale of the plastics waste challenge is illustrated by the above chart from my blog post last October. Using our ICIS Supply & Demand Database, examining the production of of 11 major polymers, some 4bn tonnes of plastic has ended up in the natural environment since 1978. Estimates like this […]
How US Could Be Squeezed Out Of Europe’s Polyethylene Market
By John Richardson EARLIER this year a commonly held view was that globalisation would slip into reverse gear with the very real prospect of a global trade war. But this view didn’t take into account China’s One Belt, One Road (OBOR) initiative, the launch of which predated the election of Donald Trump as US president […]
Where Have All The Jobs Gone?
By John Richardson POLITICIANS everywhere know that their chances of staying in office depend on how many jobs they can at the very least prevent from disappearing down the economic plughole. Ideally, they also want to be able to lay credible claims that their “long term vision” has created lots of new employment across the […]
Jump to page: