Price trends of oil , polymer feedstocks and commodity polymers for the week of 2nd April 2007

SUMMARY Oil continued to rise to reach US$66/barrel in the week of 2nd April 2007, resulting in an increase in the price of naphtha. However ethylene and propylene remained soft due to oversupply, while EDC, VCM and styrene showed an upward trend. LDPE, PVC, GPPS and ABS remained stable or stagnant while LLDPE, HDPE and PP remained soft due to lack of demand. Next few weeks will show turbulent trends due to hard oil prices. Only bearish demand could keep prices of some of the products stagnant. OIL Oil continued to rise steeply for the second week in a row and reached US$66/barrel in the week of 2nd April 2007. A decline in demand and resolving of geo political issues by the oil producing countries only could provide relief in price of oil. The next few weeks would remain uncertain. NAPHTHA An increase in price of oil also increased the price of naphtha to US$676/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007. The US-Iran conflict escalated the problem due to anticipation of further interruption of supplies from the Middle Eastern countries. It is likely to remain firm and will soften when oil cools down. POLYMER FEEDSTOCKS ETHYLENE Plenty of supplies of ethylene reduced the price of ethylene to US$850/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007 despite a sharp increase of oil price. It seems that ethylene would remain soft until the supplies dry up. PROPYLENE Propylene like ethylene also declined due to abundant supply and reached US$ 1075/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007. It is likely to remain soft due to continued abundant supplies. EDC EDC showed a slight increase to US$415-420/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007. No clear pattern is emerging yet but most likely the price of EDC is on incline. VCM VCM price appears to become harder and reached about US$720/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007. The tighter supply situation is likely to ease after some plants that are down due to annual maintenance could restart soon. The price of VCM then could soften somewhat because of rather inactive demand of PVC. STYRENE Styrene hardened due to an increase in price of oil and benzene along with naphtha. It reached US$1270/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007. It is to be seen whether higher price could be sustained because of lackluster demands of styrene monomer derivatives. POLYMERS LDPE LDPE continued to remain stable at US$1340-1350/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007 due to bearish demand from China. It is likely to remain stagnant around this price for next few weeks and until demand is revived. LLDPE LLDPE remained soft due to lack of demand in Asia particularly from China and reached US$1270-1280/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007. It is expected to continue to remain weaker in the coming few weeks. HDPE HDPE declined US$1270/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007 because of bearish demand scenario in Asian region. It is likely to remain weaker due to lackluster demand in Asia. PP Demand from China showed weakness and the price practically remained stagnant or slightly less in the week of 2nd April 2007 and reached US$1260/MT. It is not likely to go up because of bearish demand all across Asia and more particularly in China. Buying was low leading to weaker PP price - dipping to the level of US$1265/MT. PVC PVC prices, after increasing, tapered off and remained around US$1280/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007. Chinese customers are not willing to purchase PVC at a higher price compelling the Asian producers to sell it elsewhere. PS GPPS became stagnant at US$1380-1390/MT in the week of 2nd April 2007. The demand is not revived yet and therefore an effect of increasing feedstocks is not reflected in the price of GPPS. It is likely to remain stagnant in the coming few weeks. ABS A slight increase in demand from China and Hong Kong arrested decline in the price of ABS. The price in the week of 2nd April 2007 remained at US$1590/MT. It is likely to show some upward movement in the coming weeks.