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 […]
Asian Chemical Connections
Why the EU could become polyethylene self-sufficient in the post-pandemic world
By John Richardson ONE OF the many unknowns about the post-pandemic world is the extent to which the backlash against plastic rubbish will be revived. I certainly hope it is revived, otherwise, combined with climate change, our future looks pretty grim. How will the public – and thus those legislators who need to be elected […]
Coronavirus, impact on the developing world and the scale of demand losses
By John Richardson ALL OF us are struggling to come to terms with a collapse in the global economy that is poised to be worse than the Great Depression – in Britain’s case its deepest recession since the “Great Frost” of 1709. In the US, Wall Street analysts expect the US unemployment rate to still […]
Coronavirus, reshoring and the polyester industry: Good luck with that
By John Richardson POLITICIANS, not just including the Populist variety, are talking a lot about reshoring or bringing back home manufacturing supply chains in response to the coronavirus pandemic. This is partly because China’s shutdown of its manufacturing capacity in February and early March made legislators wake up to the world’s heavy reliance on China […]
Further polyethylene rate cuts seem inevitable with no certainty on who will blink first
By John Richardson IT IS NOT just a razor-like focus on petrochemicals demand that will get you through the crisis. Also essential is an equally close focus on production in a world where all the old assumptions about winners and losers have been turned upside down. But, as with demand, monitoring and forecasting production has […]
Why Asia may win and the US lose in post-virus petchems investment world
As always, these are my personal views and don’t reflect the views of ICIS By John Richardson IT IS A polyethylene (PE) world turned upside down which, in my view, will remain upside down. With oil prices set to stay around $30/bbl over the long term, the US ethane advantage is in my opinion pretty […]
Coronavirus may have made China province-level petchems data even more important
By John Richardson WHEN THE coronavirus crisis first hit China most of the focus was of course on Hubei province – the epicentre of the outbreak. One of the immediate effects was the collapse of petrochemical, automobile, steel, food processing and textiles production – the province’s biggest industries. Wind the clock forward to last week […]
Post-coronavirus world: How China could end up in a stronger position
These are, always, my views only and not the views of ICIS Here is another of attempt at long-term crystal-ball gazing where I again try to imagine the petrochemicals landscape in the post-coronavirus 2025 world. My earlier post had looked at the rise of sustainability and affordability that could work in parallel with the emergence […]
Ways of dealing with COVID-19 don’t have to be rocket science
By John Richardson IT IS all about getting through the next 12 months with minimal damage whilst preparing for what the New Normal will look like when the COVID-19 crisis is over. I believe that changes in the nature of demand will be accelerated by the virus. These changes were already well underway before this […]
Big declines in Chinese polyethylene imports, a global recession and a financial crisis
By John Richardson YOU MIGHT be hoping that sanity will be restored after the “most expensive speech history” – Donald Trump’s comments that have been unfairly or otherwise blamed for yesterday’s rout in global stock markets. But has the market really been oversold, mainly or entirely in response to a few ill-judged words from the […]
Jump to page: