Lukoil Overseas announced FM

(Lukoil) -- Lukoil Overseas (a wholly-owned subsidiary of OAO Lukoil) released an official force majeure notification under the PSA terms with regards to the CI-205 offshore geological prospecting project to the Government of Cote d'Ivoire, relevant ministries and Oranto Petroleum and PETROCI Holding partner companies. LUKOIL Overseas will resume active operations under the CI-205 project as soon as the situation in Cote d'Ivoire subsides.

MRC

(BUSINESS WIRE) -- Foster Wheeler AG (Nasdaq: FWLT) announced today that its Global Engineering and Construction Group has received a contract from Huntsman (Europe) BVBA to undertake the front-end engineering design (FEED) for the expansion of Huntsman's Isocyanates Facility at Caojing, in Shanghai, People's Republic of China. Isocyanates are used in the production of polyurethanes which have a wide range of uses in the plastics industry.

The Foster Wheeler contract value for this project was not disclosed and will be included in the company's first-quarter 2011 bookings.

Foster Wheeler's scope will include front-end engineering, technology licensor management and development of the project schedule and cost estimates. The FEED phase of the project is scheduled for completion in the third quarter of this year, with the overall project scheduled for mechanical completion by the fourth-quarter of 2013.

MRC

(ICIS) -- US ethylene contracts for March were mostly settled on Friday at 53.75 cents/lb (USD 1.185/tonne, EUR 830/t), rising by nearly 10% from February on higher production costs and a jump in spot prices. The increase, which was in line with projections, followed a 10% rise in ethane prices and a nearly 16% surge in ethylene spot prices last month.

Spot ethylene traded in a range of 53.00-60.00 cents/lb in March, rising from 44.25-53.50 cents/lb in February.

Market participants also pointed to firm demand, citing strong derivative exports as a factor pushing ethylene prices up.

According to sources, 20% of US ethylene derivative output was being exported. For polyvinyl chloride (PVC), the number was as high as 40%, sources said.

MRC

(Plastemart) -- Huntsman Corp has acquired Gujarat-based chemicals producer Laffans Petrochemicals, and has also taken the ownership of the company's 60 KT ethylene oxide derivatives facility at Ankleshwar. Laffans ethylene oxide derivatives unit set up in 1994, had revenues in excess of USD 50 mln in 2010. The Ankleshwar plant was set up under technical assistance from Reliance Industries and is in proximity to the Hazira plant. The unit operates the largest loop reactor in the country and its glycol ethers and acetates unit has a capacity of 30 KTa.

Huntsman India has its facilities at Navi Mumbai and has been having a technical collaboration with Laffans for the past two years. India contributes to a little over 3% of its global revenue of USD 9.2 bln in 2010.

MRC

(Plastemart) -- India's second leading commodity bourse NCDEX is to launch futures trading in Polyvinyl chloride (PVC). It has also decided to relaunch Brent crude oil futures with modified contract specification.

Futures contracts expiring in May, June, July and August of 2011 in PVC would be available for trading from April 4. Members (brokers) registered with the exchange are allowed to trade up to 20 KT, while that of individual can trade up to 5 KT. The unit of trading would be 5 tons and prices will be settled based on the last spot price of the day as polled by the Exchange on the last trading day of the contract.

MRC