Daily Chemical Reaction
Lingering Laura Issues Spur Prices – Export Markets Limit Stamina, PVC Appears The Best Ride
Key Points:
- US polymer producers have increasingly geared their production to serve export markets during the past decade – in this report, we discuss Hurricane Laura issues, implied export limitations to US price strength in some products and why we hold a more constructive view of PVC relative to PE and PP.
- We also discuss the August US propylene contract settlement, US methanol spot trends relative to Asia and several corporate items worth mention (e.g. Showa Denko, LyondellBasell China JV facility start-up, Sasol, ExxonMobil).
- Other items worth range from Asia naphtha markets seeing strength and two China ethylene cracker start-ups targeted this week, to the recent price strength in multiple European petrochemicals, to US MEG export concerns.
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