| SUBJECT： |
8th Asia Aromatics & Derivatives |
| DATE： |
2012-04-24 |
| LOCATION： |
Singapore |
| CONTENT： |
CNOOC Oil & Petrochemicals’ huge aromatics facility at Huizhou, Guangdong province is anticipated to resume operations. With an increase in supply, the spot prices of benzene and mixed xylenes in the Chinese domestic market are set to weaken. The facility is the country's second biggest aromatics plant and is able to produce 350,000 tonnes/year of benzene, 220,000 tonnes/year of toluene as well as 900,000 tonnes/year of MX.
The company is also expected to resume operations of its 850,000 tonnes/year paraxylene (PX) plant at the site. In case of a delay in restarting the operations at the PX plant, the domestic Chinese market will have an additional supply of 20,000-30,000 tonnes of isomer-xylenes available for spot sales from the company.
CNOOC Shell Petrochemicals has been procuring benzene from the Chinese domestic spot market during the shutdown, but these purchases will no longer support benzene prices when the facility restarts. In response to the restart, CNOOC has cancelled plans to buy from the spot market.
Demand from the downstream styrene sector is also expected to weaken because of a turnaround at Jiangsu Leasty’s 400,000 tonne/year styrene plant in November.
Above developments suggest that the Asian aromatics market is and will continue to be volatile and unpredictable. To provide a market overview on what is in store for the industry in 2012, CMT will be hosting its 8th Asia Aromatics & Derivatives on 24-25 Apr, 2012 in Singapore. Among others the conference will address the global and Asian BTX markets and its key derivatives, global economic outlook and its impact on the Asian aromatics market, as well as updates on regional projects. |
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