Market participants reported to SSESSMENTS.COM that offers for Indonesia Asahimas’ cargoes surface with significant changes ahead of the leading Taiwanese polyvinyl chloride (PVC) producer’s announcement. According to the sources, the offers are not coming directly from Indonesia Asahimas, instead, it is from a regional trader based in Singapore. A Malaysian polyvinyl chloride (PVC) compound manufacturer received import ethylene-based PVC offers for Asahimas’ cargoes nearing the $900/ton threshold, at $930/ton on LC at sight, CIF Malaysia main port basis. The source claimed that the reason behind the attractive offers to Malaysia was in order to compete with the leading Taiwanese polyvinyl chloride (PVC) producer, thus offers for Asahimas’ cargoes were released earlier than the leading Taiwanese producer.
Rumour has it that the leading Taiwanese polyvinyl chloride (PVC) producer plans to apply a huge reduction of between $120-150/ton on its upcoming August shipment offers, which means offers to the Southeast Asia market will hit around $960-1,000/ton-level CIF basis. Another Malaysian plastic product end manufacturer informed SSESSMENTS.COM that the latest import ethylene-based PVC offers for Asahimas’ cargoes are also available at the same level. However, the source is still contemplating whether to make a procurement or not, stating ‘’We are having a hard time deciding whether it is a good price to buy or if there is a possibility to go lower.’’
Furthermore, a Malaysian trader notified SSESSMENTS.COM on receiving import ethylene-based PVC offers for Asahimas’ cargoes with validation until Friday (July 8), which recorded a tremendous drop of $230/ton as compared to the deal level for July shipment. However, no deals were recorded at the time of publication. The trader is unable to predict the reason behind the attractive offer level. ‘’The producer probably has a strong hunch that the leading Taiwanese polyvinyl chloride (PVC) producer will set a huge reduction on its August shipment offers. Therefore, offers for Asahimas’ cargoes were released earlier than the leading Taiwanese producer,’’ the trader said. Speaking about feedback, the trader mentioned that the majority of end-users already have a high inventory level at the moment, thus doubts that buyers are willing to purchase cargoes even at the current low level.
