Despite Improvements In Demand From Appliances Industry, PS Outlook In Most Southeast Asian Countries Remains Gloomy
- PS offers in the region moved in a mixed trend this week
- Demand for PS in the regions is slow to robust, depending on the country
- PS prices in the region still have chances to decrease
Despite improvements in demand from the appliances industry, PS outlook in most Southeast Asian countries remains gloomy. Regarding offers, SSESSMENTS.COM was informed that PS offers in the region moved in a mixed trend this week. August delivery offers from an Indonesian PS producer increased by $50/ton for both GPPS Injection and HIPS Injection compared to last month. In Rupiah denomination, offers for the former increased by IDR500,000/ton ($27/ton) and by IDR400,000/ton ($34/ton) for the latter from last week’s levels. On the other hand, offers for local and localized GPPS Injection and HIPS Injection in Vietnam decreased by VND500,000-1,000,000/ton ($21-43/ton) compared to a fortnight ago. Regardless of the downward adjustments, deals were achieved at VND500,000/ton ($21/ton) lower than the initial offer levels. In Thailand, offers for both products were stable on a monthly comparison. A Malaysian producer decided to stop offering to the spot market for the rest of 2020 since the producer is building inventory for the upcoming maintenance and only able to provide materials for contract customers. From the import market, offers for GPPS Injection of South Korea origin to Indonesia were adjusted up by $50/ton while offers for HIPS Injection of the same origin to Vietnam increased by $20/ton compared to last week.
Demand for PS in the regions is slow to robust, depending on the country. Slow demand is seen in Vietnam due to unsatisfactory end-product sales. In Thailand, PS demand is considered moderate. Meanwhile, robust demand is observed in Indonesia and Malaysia supported by healthy demand from the appliances industry. SSESSMENTS.COM was told that an Indonesian PS producer managed to sell all allocation for August delivery within the same day the offers were announced. In the production sector, Petrochemicals (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd will start maintenance at the company’s 110,000 tons/year HIPS plant at the end of October for 40 days.
Looking ahead, the majority of market players contacted by SSESSMENTS.COM believe that PS prices in the region still have chances to decrease although demand in some countries is improving. Some players believe that downtrend in ABS Injection prices will drag down PS prices. For PS in Vietnam in particular, prices are predicted to decrease mainly due to slow demand. Market players in the country even estimate that PS prices in Vietnam will decrease by at least $30/ton next week.
