At the 2016 petrochemical industry development conference held in April 12th, the China Petroleum and Chemical Industry Federation issued the "2016 annual report on the petrochemical industry capacity warning". Petrochemical Industry Association Deputy Secretary General Sun Weishan said, 2016, petrochemical products supply and demand growth slowed down further, excess capacity and demand of the game will continue; fertilizer, soda and caustic soda industry capacity utilization is expected to further enhance the petrochemical industry; should build up the exit mechanism of backward production capacity, stable export policy, strengthen the capacity of early warning and monitoring.

Export market highlights

The report shows that in 2016, the petrochemical market favorable negative factors intertwined, the new balance of supply and demand is being rebuilt. Domestic demand, macroeconomic growth in the overall slowdown situation, petrochemical applications industry demand growth slowed down, the overall weak market demand. Automotive, chemical fiber industry is expected to be better than in 2015, the growth rate of demand for engineering plastics, chemical fiber raw materials, polyurethane materials and other products will rebound slightly.

Exports are expected to be a bright spot in the petrochemical market in 2016. The "report" shows that due to fierce competition in the domestic market and export of chemical fertilizer to cancel the "window period" of 2015, refined oil, soda ash, ammonium phosphate, PTA industry exports rose 30.3%, 22.7%, 64.3% and 34.6%. In recent years, the export amount of caustic soda, PVC, MDI, oxalic acid, methyl silicone monomer and other products to maintain rapid growth. It is expected that in 2016 the country will continue to implement a relaxed export policy, and the export of petrochemical products will continue to grow.

Product prices, 2016 international oil prices will be weak, the average annual price may be maintained at 50 U. S. dollars / barrel. Petrochemical Federation monitoring data show that in 2015 the total price of oil and chemical industry prices fell for fourth consecutive years, the largest decline to 11%. Judging from all aspects of the situation, the latest round of price falls is bottoming out. With crude oil and other commodity prices down to stabilize, in 2016 the oil and chemical industry prices will continue to rise overall situation, but little increase, about 1.5%.

Supply and demand improvement in some areas

The report pointed out that in 2016, the supply and demand of large petrochemical products will not change fundamentally. From the key products, the rate is expected to further enhance the capacity utilization of soda ash, ammonium phosphate, caustic soda, polypropylene industry; rate unchanged in 2015 by urea, PTA and polyurethane raw material production capacity; oil refinery, modern coal chemical industry, synthetic rubber and fluorine chemical industry capacity utilization levels are expected to continue to decline, overcapacity more prominent.

In 2016, the production capacity of two base products is expected to continue to decrease, or the same as in 2015, and the demand will maintain steady growth. The average annual utilization of soda ash will exceed 90%, and the production capacity will be more reasonable. The average annual utilization of caustic soda production capacity was 85%, up 7 percentage points higher than in 2015. Similarly, the impact of supply and demand optimization, polypropylene and PVC are expected in 2016 the average utilization capacity of 83% and 72%, respectively, compared with 2015, respectively, an increase of 4 percentage points and 3 percentage points.

PTA capacity utilization is expected to be about 66%, comparable to 2015. It is worth noting that, PTA raw material PX production growth is slow, in 2016 PX supply and demand more nervous, PX import volume will further increase.

Refining, modern coal chemical industry, synthetic rubber and parts of fluorine chemical industry are not optimistic. In 2016, the domestic refining capacity was maintained at about 8 tons, and the domestic market and export demand were estimated to be 6.8 tons of oil refining capacity, exceeding the demand capacity of 1.2 tons. Affected by the low oil prices and the increasingly stringent environmental laws and regulations, the coal chemical industry supply and demand contradiction prominent, if no major positive introduction, 2016 coal chemical capacity utilization will further decline. The synthetic rubber is mainly affected by the low price of natural rubber and the United States anti-dumping policy, if the export rate had no significant positive, were down 47% and 59% of the low utilization of butadiene rubber and styrene butadiene rubber annual average capacity.