Without China's Demand, Support For Japan And South Korea's PX Export Pressure Will Be Greater.

According to the latest statistics, China will add about 10 million tons / year of p-xylene (PX) capacity from March 2019 to March 2020. According to the market participants, the surge in China's PX capacity may force Japan and South Korea's major exporters to cut production in 2020.

PX profit margins drop sharply

Chinese enterprises are leading the latest wave of PX construction through a series of projects. These projects are combined with large refineries to make them more cost competitive and flexible. As the world's largest consumer of PX, China's 60%PX demand depends on imports. Since 2010, China's Polyester demand has increased by more than 1 times, and more than half of its PX imports come from Korea and Japan. The new capacity will reduce China's PX imports by about 50%. JLC consultancy researchers estimate that China's PX imports may fall to 7 million tonnes next year, further down to 4 million tons in 2021. Import volume is expected to be 12 million 600 thousand tons this year, the first annual decline in 10 years, down from a record 16 million tons in 2018.

The surge in supply in China is expected to curb PX processing margins. Hengli Group has cut nearly half its PX imports this year. Zhejiang Yisheng Petrochemical Industries Co expects that after the operation of Zhoushan petrochemical PX plant in Zhejiang, PX profits may fall to less than US $250 per ton later this year, and even lower in early 2020.

Oversupply is hard to break.

According to Singapore's August 29th news, the Asian PX market is facing an oversupply dilemma in the near future due to the dual impact of new production capacity and the continued weakness of downstream demand.

Before the end of this year, the Asian market will have 6 million 500 thousand tons / year of new PX production capacity put into operation one after another. In Brunei, Hengyi Petrochemical plans to put into operation a new 1 million 500 thousand ton / year PX plant in October. In the short term, the capacity of PX in Asia will increase faster than that of downstream PTA. Before the end of this year, Asia is expected to put in 4 million 700 thousand tons of new PTA installations. These new PTA capacity will consume 3 million 100 thousand tons / year PX.

Market participants say that the expansion of PTA capacity in Asia will accelerate in the second half of next year and Asia will add another 9 million 500 thousand tons / year PTA capacity before the end of 2020. These new PTA capacity means a total of 6 million 270 thousand tons / year PX.

Therefore, in the short term, once the new PX capacity starts in Asia, there will be a huge surplus of PX supply in the Asian market, which will limit the further expansion of PX next year. However, in the second half of next year, a large number of new PTA capacity will be put into operation in Asian market, and the supply of PX will probably be balanced.

The PX output is expected to decrease by about 438 thousand and 500 tons in September from the impact of the planned downtime and maintenance. This may prevent sudden oversupply of PX supply in Asia.

Japan and South Korea enterprises have no choice

Without the support of China's demand, the profit margins of PX producers, such as Japan's JXTG holding company, Korea's Lotte chemical and modern Cosmo Petrochemical Industries Co, are expected to decline further.

Japan's JXTG holding company said that the deterioration of the PX market caused its first quarter profit to shrink, but the company remained optimistic about the growth of PX demand in Asia, and plans to shift some of its exports to the Americas. YoshiakiOuchi, senior vice president of JXTG, said after the company's quarterly profit fell 88%, "our concern about the latest performance is the decline in PX profit margins." Japan's Nomura holdings also lowered its earnings forecast for the JXTG2021 fiscal year.

"We see that many Asian exporters are drastically reducing the start-up rate of PX devices," said DarrylXu, chief analyst of Asian chemicals at Wood McKenzie, a consultancy. In areas where refining and aromatics margins are relatively low, the possibility of manufacturers closing or integrating production capacity will also increase.

JLC consulting company researchers said that China could increase 14 million tons / year PX capacity from 2020 to 2023. This will help increase the supply of gasoline in Asia. Because PX and other aromatic chemicals can be used to increase the octane number of gasoline, the PX producers in Korea and Japan may turn PX into gasoline blending components to cope with the increasing supply of PX in China. DarrylXu said that Asia could increase 150 thousand barrels of gasoline a day by 2021. The PX exporters of Japan and South Korea will soon face a dilemma: continue to compete for the shrinking export market, or turn aromatics into a much larger gasoline market. How they choose ultimately depends on the market trend.