A Middle Eastern producer contacted by SSESSMENTS.COM addressed buyers’ attitude toward the current PE and PP price trend in the international market. Recently, buyers are more objecting toward high prices especially when the China market is already on a downward trend. For PE cargoes, Malaysian buyers in particular are not willing to accept current prices as rumour has it that some producers in the country are selling HDPE Film to the local market in USD denomination at around $890-900/ton; delivered to big-sized players in Malaysia. At the same time, market talks have it that there are US HDPE Film cargoes purchased at $900/ton on LC at sight, CIF Malaysia Main Port basis but the shipment is from Taiwan. Due to this, most buyers are unwilling to take offers at above $900/ton-level.
For other PE grades such as LDPE Film and LLDPE Film C4 of Qatari origin which captured on a downtrend as of recent has also pushed buyers to the sidelines and makes other offers deemed unworkable. Considering buyers' stance, the producer is now contemplating whether the company should give better prices to the customers as they believe that deals surely could not be achieved at the current levels, SSESSMENTS.COM was told.
As for PP, a stiff resistance also shown by buyers for the current PP Block Copolymer offers due to suffering of the auto sector. Besides, although most producers are now focusing on spunbond; it should not affect the availability of PP Block Copolymer. As such, most buyers find it difficult in accepting the prices. On the other front, some producers will no longer sell PP Block Copolymer materials at almost the similar level to PP Homo Raffia like last month. Further added to SSESSMENTS.COM, the producer commented that the lack of manpower in the Middle East should not be counted as the major issue and believed that it should not significantly affect the inventory.
