The price of oil plummeted by 25% in more than a month! Is the chemical raw material really falling or illusion？

Recently, US crude oil futures fell 7.1%, falling for 12 consecutive trading days, hitting the biggest one-day drop in more than three years. Crude oil prices continued to fall in the oversupply situation at the beginning of the year, New York crude oil futures prices and London Brent crude oil Futures prices closed down 27.11% and 24.12% respectively from the highs set on October 3. International oil prices have fallen for 12 consecutive years and have plummeted by more than 25%. This situation is the first time in 38 years since 1980.

So, what is the reason for the oil price so plunged?

We all know that the international oil price is largely determined by the relationship between supply and demand. As the leader of OPEC and one of the largest oil producers in Saudi Arabia, its production regulation has a great influence on the global crude oil supply. The Saudi government was deeply mired in the "Reporter's Incident" not long ago, and Trump said that sanctions should not be ruled out. The sanctions did not happen, and the Saudi government’s “increasing production response” was obtained. Its Energy Minister Falih announced that Saudi Arabia would continue to increase production in November as promised. In the US, the continuous increase in US crude oil inventories and the record high crude oil output have also kept oil prices under pressure.

The strengthening of the US dollar, the rise in international crude oil production, the relaxation of sanctions against Iran, etc., these factors have influenced each other and contributed to the fall in oil prices. Almost overnight, the global crude oil supply side changed from “tightening worry” to “excessive worry”, and the demand side is not expected to be optimistic. Affected by the sharp drop in oil prices, energy stocks fell across the board, and many chemical raw materials prices also fell.

According to data from the Information Center of the Coatings Purchasing Network, from the beginning of November to November 16, among the 73 important chemical products, 47 products fell, accounting for 64.38%. The top five products were hydrochloric acid (-32.52%). , toluene (-27.17%), mixed xylene (-21.93%), styrene (-16.87%) and methanol (-15.82%), including para-xylene (PX), ethylene glycol and PTA, all of which are polyester industries. The main varieties of the chain, due to the current domestic supply of ethylene glycol and PX still need a large number of imports, such as ethylene glycol import dependence of up to 58.8%, while PX40% need to import, the market price is completely dependent on changes in the international market. The production of ethylene glycol and PX is mainly from crude oil, and there are currently varying degrees of decline.

For the chemical industry, the impact of falling oil prices is mixed. With the fall in crude oil prices, most chemicals lost their cost support and product prices followed. This has led to the impairment of raw material inventories of some chemical companies. Downstream has the characteristics of “buy up and not buy down”. In the process of falling crude oil prices, it is expected that the prices of raw materials will fall, and tend to reduce the amount of purchases. As a result, the entire industry chain will go to stocks and demand will shrink. At present, most of the chemical products are overcapacity, which is even worse for the decline of chemical products in the future.

The industry believes that although the time for oil prices to fall below $70 is still short, there has not been a substantial impact on the entire industry chain. For mature industries, after the external increase slows down, the profits of the whole industry will flow within the industrial chain, such as from upstream to midstream and downstream. "It is almost the same as before and after the fall of crude oil, the midstream products began to plummet. For example, ethylene glycol was still around 7,500 yuan per ton in October, and has now fallen to 5,800 yuan." A chemical industry official in Chengdu said on the 15th. In his view, the main reason for the decline in midstream products is that the cost support brought by crude oil disappears. “This is equivalent to the most direct fuse.” After the decline in midstream products, the production costs of downstream enterprises will decrease. In the short run, companies will suffer the impact of inventory price declines, but in the medium to long term, falling oil prices will reduce the cost of production companies, which will obviously increase their gross profit margin for companies with pricing power.

There is still a lot of uncertainty in the fluctuation of oil prices on the opening of the oil price adjustment window on November 30. Market analysts said that oil prices have bottomed out, and it is normal for downstream chemical raw materials to fall. If the oil price completely enters the bear market, chemical raw materials may appear to be self-help, not necessarily falling, and even reverse price increases. Case