Price trends of oil, feedstocks & commodity polymers for 30th April 2007

SUMMARY Oil after hardening in the last week remained stable around US $ 65/barrel in the week of 30th April 2007. It is likely to remain around US $ 65/barrel in May 2007. Naphtha gained sharply due to higher price of oil. It is likely to remain flatter around US $ 695/MT in May 2007. During the week of 30th April 2007 only ethylene surged ahead due to rising demand from China. All other commodity polymer feedstocks remained stable. PVC was the only commodity polymer that remained inactive & therefore flat. PE of all type due to increased demand from China gained. PP gained marginally mainly because of building up higher stocks due to present holiday season. Both GPPS & ABS gained ABS is likely to increase further due to higher demand. GPPS on the other hand could remain range bound at the present price of US $ 1420/Mt in the remaining weeks of May 2007. May 2007 could see increase in ethylene, styrene from feedstocks & all types of PE types as well as ABS.PVC & PP could remain flat. OIL Oil after a sharp increase of the last week continued to remain in the range of US $ 64-66/barrelin the week of 30th April 2007. A fear of sabotage in Saudi Arabia oil storage seemed to trigger the price rise. Oil is likely to remain firm around US $ 65/barrel in remaining part of May 2007. NAPHTHA Naphtha gained sharply to US $ 692-695/MT in the week of 30th April 2007 mainly due to higher price of oil. It is expected to remain around US $ 690-695/MT in the remaining weeks of May 2007 POLYMER FEEDSTOCKS ETHYLENE Ethylene price continued to rise & reached US $ 1000/MT in the week of 30th April 2007 due to increasing demand all across Asia. Higher price of oil also contributed to this rise. Ethylene will continue to rise & possibly reach US $ 1100/MT or even could inch upwards around US $ 1200 towards the end of May 2007. PROPYLENE Propylene price continued to remain stable around US $ 1105/MT in the week of 30th April 2007. It is expected to remain range bound around US $ 1100-1120/MT in May 2007. EDC EDC continued to remain around US $ 380-400/MT in the week of 30th April 2007. Apparently the demand of downstream products does not seem to pick up. It is likely to remain stagnant around US $ 400/MT in the remaining weeks of May 2007. VCM VCM remained range bound around US $ 770-780/MT in the week of 30th April 2007 due to rather lackluster demand in PVC in Asia. VCM is expected to retain its price around US $ 770/MT or gain by about US $ 10-20/MT due to tighter supply situation in the remaining weeks of May 2007. STYRENE Styrene after a steep increase in the last week seems to have stabilized around US $ 1290-1300/MT in the week of 30th April 2007. The suppliers are interested in higher prices of US $ 1325/MT due to higher prices of oil & benzene. However, the demand does not seem to get revived. It is therefore expected that the price of styrene monomer could remain range bound around US $ 1300-1315/MT in the remaining weeks of May 2007. POLYMERS LDPE LDPE firmed up & reached US $ 1350/MT in the week of 30th April 2007. The demand was particularly high from China. LDPE will continue to be at about US $ 1350-1360/MT in the remaining weeks of May 2007. LLDPE LLDPE also started rising because of higher demand of LDPE from China. Also rising HDPE propelled an increase in LLDPE. For the week of 30th April 2007 LLDPE was at US $ 1285-1300/MT. It is likely to remain around US $ 1300/MT in the remaining weeks of May 2007. HDPE HDPE due to higher demand from China gained to US $ 1290-1300/MT in the week of 30th April 2007. It is expected that HDPE will continue to remain firm in the remaining weeks of May & ultimately reach 1320/MT towards the end of May 2007. PP PP gained marginally to reach US $ 1265-1270/MT mainly due to stock piling in stocks in China on account of present holiday season. However, the demand is still not revived & therefore the price of PP could remain flat at around US $ 1260-1270/MT in the later part of May 2007. PVC PVC was inactive & its price hovered around US $ 920-930/MT in the week of 30th April 2007. For the month of May 2007 there is no likelihood of revival of demand of PVC The price of PVC therefore will continue to remain flat in May 2007. PS Higher styrene monomer price because of higher price of oil & benzene impacted the price of GPPS. It reached US $ 1420/MT in the week of 30th April 2007. It is likely to remain stable around US $ 1420/MT in the remaining weeks of May 2007. ABS ABS on account of higher feedstock prices as well as some revival of demand gained & reached US $ 1620/MT. The suppliers are keen to still increase the price to US $ 1650/MT. May 2007 definitely will see some further gain in the price of ABS. It is quite likely that it could reach US $ 1640/MT in case it can not go to US $ 1650/MT.