Tight supply continue pushing ABS offers higher in Vietnam, buyers are shied away

Several international producers have lifted ABS offers to Vietnam this week by $40-50/ton on the back of persistent tight supply condition. At the other end of the spectrum, many buyers decided to just uphold the wait and see position, citing current market has surged beyond acceptance levels.

Taiwanese ABS offered at $2070/ton CIF Vietnam, LC AS term with a distributor said, “Our principal supplier continue to pay heavy attention to China market, hence very limited allocation is given to Vietnam. Our customers can only accept cargoes at $2000/ton with the same term, hence we are unable to conclude any deal this week.”

A South Korean maker has not been giving any offers to Vietnam for several weeks in a row added, “We are able to achieve better margins in other market. Given healthy demand in China, lack of inventories pressure at suppliers’ side and strong upstream costs, we believed that the current trend might persist in the near term.”

Local availability is not comfortable too, yet a number of converters decided to lower operating rate to counterbalance rapid surging raw material costs. “Our customers are unable to accept the current market prices, hence refused to place new orders. We prefer to take cautious stance about fresh buy for now,” a household product manufacturer informed.

Import ABS to Vietnam currently stands in the range $2050-2070/ton CIF, LC AS term.