Next week, I will publish my annual Budget Outlook, covering the 2016-2018 period. The aim, as always, is to challenge conventional wisdom when this seems to be heading in the wrong direction: The 2007 Outlook ‘Budgeting for a Downturn‘, and 2008’s ‘Budgeting for Survival’ meant I was one of the few to forecast the 2008 Crisis 2009′s ‘Budgeting […]
Chemicals and the Economy
The “China Chill” slows global economy and petrochemicals
There were record numbers at last week’s European Petrochemical Association annual meeting in Berlin. But most of the 2900 attendees were in subdued mood. Once again, it seems, the industry has chosen to sanction vast new investment at the top of the cycle, and will now suffer the consequences as it all comes online at […]
5 Critical Questions every Company and Investor Need to Answer
Today’s uncertain economic and oil price environment has created chaos in petrochemical feedstock and product markets. This creates major risks for producers, consumers and investors. ICIS and International eChem have therefore decided to combine our resources to launch a new Study, that will analyse the potential impact of these developments on the olefins, aromatics and […]
Markets worry real world issues may trump monetary stimulus
Something has clearly changed in global financial markets in recent weeks. Not only have they been falling, but real world issues have begun to provide a negative impact. This sounds a strange statement. But it simply means that in the past, markets have seen “bad news” as being good news. They expected that it would […]
Oil heads to $30/bbl as Great Unwinding reaches 1st anniversary
Global markets are becoming ever more complex as the Great Unwinding of stimulus policies continues. This means that each blog post is now taking much longer to write. It therefore seems sensible to focus on writing 3 posts each week – on Monday, Wednesday and Friday – in order to continue to provide the highest possible […]
China electricity consumption growth drops to 1% in H1
Latest data for China’s economy continue to suggest a major slowdown is underway: Rail freight, one of Premier Li’s key data points, was down 11% in January – May versus 2014 Total lending was down 15% in H1 versus 2014, with shadow lending down 50% And electricity consumption, his 3rd data point, was up just […]
Fears of Austerity rise again, as Stimulus proves ineffective
Austerity is in the news again, as the Greek/Eurozone debt negotiations continue. So it seems interesting to see how financial market sentiment has been moving with regard to the issues of austerity and stimulus. The above chart is therefore modeled on the familiar IeC Boom/Gloom Index It shows the ratio of sentiment for Austerity versus […]
Bank of Japan admits stimulus policy is modelled on Peter Pan
‘Peter Pan’ is one of the world’s most-loved children’s stories.But I hadn’t realised it had also become an economics textbook, at least in Japan. Yet the Governor of the Bank of Japan (BoJ), Haruhiko Kuroda, described his stimulus policy last week as follows to an invited audience: “I trust that many of you are familiar with […]
Europe can win despite age trends
We all know that Europe has an ageing population. Germany and Italy, for example, have median ages of 45 years. And fertility rates have been below replacement levels for 45 years, so the relative number of higher-spending young people is reducing. Instead, there are more and more older people, as life expectancy at age 65 […]
Gloom turns to boom as US economic data disappoints, again
“If only US GDP growth could remain negative in Q2, what a lot of money we could make”. You could almost hear the excited chatter in financial markets on Friday, as news spread that revised data showed the US economy had seen negative growth in Q1. This is yet another example of the upside-down world […]
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