I was in India this week as the Times of India carried a front page cartoon of a bull dressed in a Superman outfit with an ‘S’ on his shirt to mark the Sensex surging past 20,000. All the talk was of the index taking 20 years to reach its first 10,000 with the second 10,000 added in only 20 months.
The belief among just about everybody you talked to at the first Asian Chemical and Petrochemical Conference* in Mumbai was that Asia had decoupled from the US – meaning, even a US recession would not have a major impact on growth in India, China and elsewhere.
Indeed, investors have been pouring cash out of western and into Asian markets in response to the sub-prime mortgage crisis, lower US interest rates, and the prospect of continued strong economic growth in Asia. *The conference was organised by ICIS and the Indian Chemical Council.
As far as petrochemical demand was concerned, delegates and speakers were forecasting double digit growth for the foreseeable future.
Is this just too good to be true?
