By John Richardson AS you can see from the above chart, ever since April 1997, when we first started providing price quotes for spot Northeast Asian (NEA) high-density polyethylene (HDPE) film grade, it has been spot ethylene rather than spot naphtha prices that have driven HDPE prices. You can find the same pattern for any […]
Asian Chemical Connections
How To Solve Deflation: People Need To Retire Later
By John Richardson AN economic theory is only of any use if it actually works in practice and if it becomes obvious it doesn’t work what is the first thing you should do? Well, of course, the answer is you scrap that theory and start again. Not, sadly, in the case of the Fed who, […]
Chasing Inflation: When Something Doesn’t Work, Stop Doing It
By John Richardson In Greek mythology Sisyphus was punished for chronic deceitfulness by being compelled to roll an immense boulder up a hill, only to watch it roll back down, repeating this action forever. There is a good comparison here with what the Fed and the European Central Bank have been trying to do with inflation. […]
The Long Term Average Price Of Oil Is $30 A Barrel
By John Richardson OIL and petrochemicals markets have behaved from mid-February until today as if the world is about to return to the way it was in the first half of last year. Here is the thinking behind this behaviour: What happened from around September 2014 onwards in crude market until mid-February of this year […]
China’s Currency Appreciates By 26% In Four Years
By John Richardson THE above chart further illustrates the dilemma confronting China, which, despite the often-discussed and wrongly interpreted growth in its domestic consumption, still depends on exports for about a quarter of its GDP. Based on Bank of International Settlements (BIS) data, and compiled by the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis, the chart […]
Getting Started On Rebuilding Your Company Strategy
By John Richardson THE New Normal is a journey of discovery, as my colleague Paul Hodges pointed out in his blog post yesterday. As this latest global economic crisis develops, it is vital that we start the journey otherwise many of us will end up out of work. Some chemicals companies will simply not survive […]
Ten Reasons Why US Petrochemicals Should Think Again
By John Richardson IT is incredibly hard to “stare a gift horse in the mouth” when your share options have soared in value and you annual bonuses, based on your company’s record-breaking profitability, have been nothing short of fantastic for the last few years. Why on earth, also, even bother to rock the boat when […]
Global Deflation
By John Richardson TEN trillion dollars doesn’t buy what it used to do, according to The Wall Street Journal. The reason is that despite central banks across the world aggressively expanding their balance sheets, there is no inflation. “My customers in China are worried about the opposite – global deflation because demand everywhere is so […]
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