Petrochemicals review: Where we are now and where we’re going
Petro chemical Supplying Company ( Petro CSC )
Petro Chemical Supplying Company is a global Group based in Iran which produce and provides chemicals raw materials .
The petrochemical industry may have reached the bottom of the cycle, but a look forward shows modest improvement in market conditions on the horizon.
This year’s trajectory for petrochemicals has been marked by softening demand, increased capacity online, historically low earnings across various chemical value chains, and slowing growth in circularity. However, we expect moderate improvement in the near term, particularly toward the end of 2024.
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By contrast, 2023 unfolded against a backdrop of fluctuating trends in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.1 In 2020, demand uncertainty ultimately led to resilience as consumers shifted the bulk of their spending from services to goods purchases. The subsequent years saw record earnings for many value chains, fueled by strong demand coupled with supply chain disruptions. In late 2022, however, the situation reversed: supply chains reopened, retailers scaled back on building inventory, and inflation accelerated. At the same time, the Russian invasion of Ukraine affected energy costs and local demand for European producers, and strong China-led demand recovery was noticeably absent.
Despite these challenges, conditions may now be in place for a more typical recovery cycle, albeit one that plays out over several years. Forecasts show demand growing to match existing and in-progress capacity in some chains, and supply chains maintaining somewhat “normal” price linkages among regions.
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Looking back
In 2023, the petrochemical industry saw a challenging period marked by slow demand growth and surplus capacity. Although many of these changes occurred in Europe and Asia, this downturn reveals four major themes shaping the global industry’s current situation.
Global economic weakness and destocking drove demand deceleration
The global economy experienced less growth in 2023 than in the previous year. This was primarily because of sluggish macroeconomics in the European Union and lower-than-expected growth in China, and it contributed to a challenging economic environment leading to lower end-market demand. Based on quarterly growth and the consensus view, GDP globally and in the European Union reached some of the lowest levels of the past decade (excluding 2020), falling to approximately 2.6 and 1.0 percent, respectively.2 And China’s GDP growth slowed to around 5 percent, weaker than average pracademic annual growth of 6 to 8 percent.
In addition to weakened GDP growth, a number of petrochemical players noted major slowdowns or even declining demand, in many cases linked to downstream inventory (destocking). On this point, retailers built up inventories from 2021 to the first half of 2022 after supply chain disruptions caused by the pandemic left them at low levels. During this time, demand for chemicals was strong because consumer demand was geared toward goods.
Starting in the second half of 2022, however, supply chain disruptions subsided, and interest rates rose, which led retailers and other businesses to trim their elevated inventory levels. In terms of demand, this created a headwind for upstream products, such as consumer goods and packaging. Similar to a “bullwhip effect,” demand loss was higher in magnitude further upstream—particularly affecting chemical players.
Although destocking has continued at the retail level since the second half of 2022, end-market sectors still face elevated inventory levels compared with before the pandemic. For example, players in consumer-packaged goods and plastic-and-paper packaging saw inventory levels 15 to 20 percent above pre-COVID-19 levels, which could indicate a headwind for demand in 2024 (Exhibit 1).