Lukoil replaced the head of the board of directors for the first time in 20 years

MOSCOW (MRC) - Lukoil’s board of directors has compiled a list of candidates to vote on the company's board of directors at the annual general meeting of shareholders, the company said.

The current chairman of the board, Valery Graifer, is not included in the list of candidates for the new composition of the board of directors of Lukoil.

Graefer has been in charge of the board since 2000. November 20, 2019 he turned 90 years old. Graifer owns a 0.012% stake in Lukoil.

Instead of Graifer, the vice-president of Lukoil Nikolai Nikolaev was nominated to the board of directors.

The following members are recommended for election to the company’s board of directors: former Deputy Minister of Finance Sergey Shatalov, ex-Federal Chancellor of Austria, member of the Supervisory Board of RWE AG, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation Wolfgang Schussel, former manager of Troika Dialog, former head of Deutsche Bank in Russia, now the independent director of Rusnano and president of Matrix Advisors LLC Pavel Teplukhin, head of LUKOIL Vagit Alekperov, top managers of the company Ravil Maganov and Leonid Fedun, former chief accountant of Lyubov NK Khoba, Rector of Moscow State Law University. O.E. Kutafina Victor Blazheev, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Russian-British Chamber of Commerce Roger Mannings and member of the American-Russian Business Council (ARDS), expert of the Valdai International Discussion Club, president of TTG Global LLC Toby Gati.

Also, the Director General of Russian Innovative Fuel and Energy Company LLC (RITEK LLC) Nikolay Nikolaev was nominated for election.

Earlier it was reported that Lukoil took the second place in market capitalization in Russia after the company's shares updated their historic highs against corporate news.

Lukoil is one of the leading vertically integrated oil companies in Russia. The main activities of the company include exploration and production of oil and gas, production and sale of petroleum products. Lukoil is the second largest privately owned oil company in the world in terms of proven hydrocarbon reserves. The structure of Lukoil includes one of the largest petrochemical enterprises in Russia - Stavrolen. Previously, the company also included Karpatneftekhim, the largest polymer producer in Ukraine, but in February 2017, Lukoil completed a sale of this asset.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) - Imports of PET chips into Russia increased by 31% in January of this year compared to the same time a year ago and reached 11,570 tonnes compared to 8,8700 tonnes (excluding supplies from Belarus over the past two months), according to MRC's DataScope.

A month earlier, import deliveries of material to the Russian market were at the level of 14,940 tonnes. The share of Chinese material was 58% (6,700 tonnes) in January versus 75% (11,600 tonnes) a month earlier.

In January, the share of Chinese material in total imports amounted to 94% (8,300 tonnes).

The largest Chinese material suppliers were Jiangsu Sanfangxiang - 2,900 tonnes, Yisheng - 1,700 tonnes, Indorama - 1,200 tonnes.

MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Overall imports of general purpose polystyrene (GPPS) and high impact polystyrene (HIPS) to Ukraine dropped in the first month of 2020 by 8% year on year to 1,440 tonnes, according to MRC's DataScope report.

This figure was at 1,570 tonnes in January 2019.

GPPS and HIPS imports were 1,940 tonnes in December 2019.

At the same time, Ukrainian companies increased their HIPS imports in January 2020 by 48% year on year: from 570 tonnes in January 2019 to 840 tonnes, imports were 660 tonnes a month earlier.

At the same time GPPS imports fell in January 2020 by 40% to 600 tonnes from 1,000 tonnes a year earlier. Imports of material were at 1,280 tonnes in December 2019.

Imports of Russian GPPS and HIPS of Nizhnekamskneftekhim to Ukraine grew in the first month of 2020 by 6% year on year to 699 tonnes. This figure was at 660 tonnes in January 2019. Imports of material from Russia was in December 2019 at the minimum for the recent years - 480 tonnes, down by 46% from the stated period.

Nizhnekamskneftekhim's material accounted for 48% in the overall structure of imports to the Ukrainian market in the first months of 2020, compared to 42% in January 2019.

MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Sahara International Petrochemical Co. (Sipchem) has announced an unplanned turnaround maintenance at its propane dehydrogenation (PDH) facility owned by subsidiary Al Waha at Jubail, Saudi Arabia, reported Chemweek.

The turnaround started 3 March 2020 and is planned to be completed within two weeks.

This is the latest stoppage at the PDH plant, which has been dogged by operational problems over the past few years. Sipchem says the aim is to enhance the reliability of the plant and allow it to achieve its future operational targets.

The PDH plant is designed to produce 467,000 metric tons/year of propylene. It supplies a 450,000-metric tons/year of polypropylene (PP) plant at the site. Financial impact of the unplanned stoppage will be reflected in Sipchem’s first-quarter financial results. Al Waha has taken the necessary actions to limit the potential impact on customers, Sipchem says.

As MRC wrote previously, Al Waha Petrochemicals shut its PP plant for a maintenance turnaround from 27 December 2019 to 8-9 January 2020.

Propylene is the main feedstock for the production of PP.

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, the estimated PP consumption in the Russian market was 1,260,400 tonnes in January-December 2019, up by 4% year on year. Supply of almost all grades of propylene polymers increased, except for statistical copolymers of propylene (PP random copolymers).

Established in 1999, Saudi International Petrochemical Company (Sipchem) manufactures and markets methanol, butanediol, tetrahydrofuran, acetic acid, acetic anhydride, vinyl acetate monomer. Besides, it has launched several down-stream projects to manufacture ethylene vinyl acetate, low density polyethylene, ethyl acetate, butyl acetate, cross linkable polyethylene, and semi conductive compound.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Lotte Chemical, has declared a force majeure (FM) on styrene monomer (SM) supplies from its unit in Daesan, according to Apic-online.

A Polymerupdate source in the South Korea informed that, the company has declared a FM following an unplanned shutdown at the upstream cracker. Further details on duration of the FM could not be ascertained.

As MRC informed earlier, the cracker was shut, following an explosion at the plant's compressor on Wednesday, February 4, 2020, at around 3:00 am.

Located at Daesan, South Korea, the SM plant has a production capacity of 580,000 mt/year.

SM is the main feedstock for the production of polystyrene (PS).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated consumption of PS and styrene plastics was 46,260 tonnes in December 2019, up by 8% year on year. The estimated consumption of PS and styrene plastics totalled 500,660 tonnes in 2019, down by 1% year on year. Russian producers of PS and styrene plastics produced 44,960 tonnes of material in December 2019, up by 1% year on year.

Lotte Chemical runs two naphtha crackers in South Korea. One cracker is located in Daesan county in Seosan which can produce 1.1 million tonnes per year of ethylene with the other 1.2 million tonnes per year cracker in the southwestern city of Yeosu.
MRC