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MOSCOW (MRC) -- The Competition
Commission of India (CCI) has cleared SABIC BV's incremental acquisition of a
6.51% shareholding in Clariant AG, according to Apic-online.
The transaction,
which will raise SABIC's stake in Clariant to 31.5%, is part of SABIC's growth
strategy in specialties.
In September 2018, the companies signed a
memorandum of understanding to merge their specialty chemicals businesses into a
new high-performance materials specialty chemicals business, following SABIC's
purchase of a 24.99% interest in Clariant, which was completed the same
month.
Last July, the parties agreed to temporarily postpone discussions
of merging the businesses, attributing the delay to unfavorable market
conditions.
As MRC wrote
before, SABIC swung to a second-quarter net loss of 2.22 billion Saudi
riyals (USD587 million) from a net profit of SR2.03 billion in the prior-year
period. The loss for the three-month period to end-June is mainly attributed to
lower average product prices, lower sales volumes, and an impairment charge of
SR1.18 billion related primarily to "certain petrochemical assets in the
European region," Sabic says. The company, acquired by Saudi Aramco for USD69.1
billion in a deal completed in June, says the lower prices and volumes were
mainly due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The adjusted net loss figure
of SR1.04 billion, excluding the asset write-down, missed analysts’ consensus
estimate for a profit of SR900 million. Sabic reported a net loss of SR1.05
billion in the first quarter of this year.
We remind that Sinopec SABIC
Tianjin Petrochemical Co. (SSTPC), a 50-50 joint venture of Sinopec and SABIC,
completed the
debottlenecking of its ethylene cracker on 11 July 2020, adding another 30,000
tons/year output to its current capacity. Followed the expansion, the Tianjin
based plant become the country's largest compressor unit, producing 1.3 million
tons of ethylene annually.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for
producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's DataScope report,
PE imports to Russia dropped in January-June 2020 by 7% year on year to 328,000
tonnes. High density polyethylene (HDPE) accounted for the main decrease in
imports. At the same time, PP imports into Russia rose in the first six months
of 2020 by 21% year on year to 105,300 tonnes. Propylene homopolymer
(homopolymer PP) accounted for the main increase in imports.
Saudi Basic
Industries Corporation (Sabic) ranks among the world"s top petrochemical
companies. The company is among the world"s market leaders in the production of
polyethylene, polypropylene and other advanced thermoplastics, glycols, methanol
and fertilizers. |
