Overseas sellers maintain import PET offers stable to firmer levels to Vietnam

After a brief reduction reported in the previous week, major overseas suppliers decided to maintain fresh PET offers to Vietnam on the stable to firmer levels citing support from surging energy market and lack of sales pressure.

Latest offers indicating $10/ton increased for Chinese materials at $1370-1375/ton while Indonesian cargoes at $1425-1430/ton and Indian origin at $1350-1355/ton, all based on CIF Vietnam, LC AS term.

“Several of our regular customers have sent in new inquiries following a strong surge in crude oil futures. Supply is still not comfortable as our Chinese principal supplier has sold out July allocation,” a distributor said.

Meanwhile, other buyers are rather cautious about the fresh buy citing that the current trend is mainly driven by the energy complex and that supply is improving with the new startup in Vietnam and China. “Demand for our end product is not strong in the third quarter of the year and hence, we decided to be more conservative. Prices might not drop significantly in the near term, in the meantime, we are not confident about the sustainability of any increases,” a bottle maker commented.

As reported earlier, Far Eastern Petrochemicals Vietnam is set to bring its newly constructed PET bottle plant in Vietnam on-stream by end of July. The unit is designed to produce 400,000 tons/year.

On the other hand, China’s Jiangsu Xingye (SFX) started the trial run at its new 500,000 tons/year PET plant in China earlier this week. The company is expected to achieve on-spec cargoes by end of June 2018.