By John Richardson THE ABOVE chart on the left might not happen, of course. China could remain a huge sink for high-density polyethylene (HDPE) exports up to 2031 and probably beyond that year. The chart is an updated version of my estimates from earlier this year – the chart on the right, which I’ve included […]
Asian Chemical Connections
Booming internet sales point towards strong 2021-2025 LLDPE demand growth
By John Richardson ONLINE SALES accounted for 19% of all retail sales in seven industrialised countries in 2020, up from 16% the year before, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). Year-on-year online sales growth numbers by country in 2020 included 59% in Australia, 46.7% in Britain and 14.6% […]
China will create petrochemicals deflation with the only question being how
By John Richardson THE FEEDBACK I have received on my series of posts about the potential for rapidly rising Chinese petrochemicals self-sufficiency has focused on the detail. “I don’t see China building that many new paraxylene (PX) plants because they are already long on gasoline, so they cannot keep adding refineries to supply the mixed […]
Iran may gain 48% of total China HDPE imports, 85% of LDPE imports by 2025 because of new deal
By John Richardson IRAN and China earlier this month signed a wide-ranging economic and security agreement that has been under negotiation for five years. The deal involves $400bn of investment in the overall Iranian economy with as much as $280bn of spending on oil, gas and petrochemicals. Before I crunch the data and demonstrate how […]
Iran and China new deal could hasten Belt & Road Initiative petrochemicals self-sufficiency
By John Richardson ONCE AGAIN, please don’t say I didn’t tell you. A proposed new investment and security agreement between Iran and China is the kind of closer relationship I had expected back in September 2016 when I wrote: China’s demand for oil is forecast to grow from 6m bbl/day today to 13m bbl/day by […]
The Iran-West Nuclear Deal: An Update
By John Richardson MANY thanks to a good friend of the blog, Mark Mark Mirosevic-Sorgo, managing director of the Singapore-headquartered shipbrokers Braemar Quincannon for what follows – some excellent analysis of what the Iran-West nuclear deal might mean for the petrochemicals business, which follows on from our earlier post. Here are Mark’s comments: It has […]
Iran Remains Optimistic On Exports
Dubai crucial for Iran By Malini Hariharan The blog recently had an opportunity to talk to a few Iranian companies and was impressed by their sanguine approach to the challenges posed by the new round of sanctions. This too shall pass was the prevailing philosophy. “We have a long experience [in dealing with sanctions]; […]
China, Russia To Boost Iranian Ethylene Trade?
Iran’s South Pars gas field Source of picture: www.petropars.com By John Richardson THE ability of Iran to further exploit its huge natural gas reserves – and in so doing maintain ethylene exports at constant levels throughout the year – now appears to hinge on Chinese investment (Western companies have withdrawn from the Iranian energy […]
Sinopec and Iran’s NPC Sign Investment MOU
Out of the investment deep-freeze? Source: tehrandaily.wordpress.com By John Richardson A VERY interesting story from my colleague Bee Lin Chow on ICIS news today reports the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between Sinopec and Iran’s National Petrochemical Co (NPC). The agreement will explore joint- venture opportunities in petrochemicals and related businesses in […]
The Iranian investment struggle
Source of picture: www.textually.org The political sensitivity surrounding Iran is so great that US-based companies are not even allowed to attend presentations by Iranian officials at conferences, a source said. “I witnessed a recent walk-out during a presentation by the National Iranian Oil & Distribution Company (NIODC),” he said. But a European office […]
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