European Commission demands chemicals firm BASF pay USD217 m to Belgium

MOSCOW (MRC) -- The European Commission is demanding that the largest chemical producer in the world, BASF, pay 200 million euros (USD217 million) in unpaid taxes to Belgium, said Sputniknews.

The European Commission announced that Belgium had granted tax advantages that are at odds with the Commission's rules to at least 35 multinational companies, and ordered the country to recover 700 million euros in unpaid tax. The Commission’s investigation revealed that Belgian so-called "express profit" tax scheme, which enabled multinational companies to pay lower taxes, was operating in breach of EU rules.

The Belgian L’Echo newspaper said that British American Tobacco, BP, the Swedish industrial company Atlas Copco, and AB InBev brewing company would also be affected by the decision.

The newspaper added that the country’s finance minister, Johan Van Overtveldt, has been given two months to submit a plan for recovering the 700 million euros, as instructed by the European Commission.

Belgium is one among several countries accused of applying illegal tax breaks to certain companies. In October 2015, the European Commission announced that Luxembourg and the Netherlands had illegal tax deals with Italian automaker Fiat and the coffee chain Starbucks, respectively.

Apple in Ireland, and Amazon and McDonald’s in Luxembourg are also under investigation.

As MRC informed earlier, in the early September 2015, Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee, Kurt Bock, Chairman of the Board of Executive Directors of BASF SE, Klaus Schafer, Member of the Board of Management, E.ON SE, Pierre Chareyre, Executive vice-president of ENGIE, Rainer Seele, Chairman of the Executive Board of OMV and Ben van Beurden, Chief Executive Officer of Royal Dutch Shell signed a Shareholders’ Agreement on implementation of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline project to enhance supply of natural gas to the European Union’s market.


MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- A greenfield petrochemical complex will be set up jointly by HPCL & Gail in Andhra Pradesh, giving a fillip to the plastic processing industry in the state, according Ananth Kumar, Minister for Chemicals and Fertilisers, as per Business-standard.

"On behalf of the centre, I am making in-principle announcement that HPCL and Gail together would establish a greenfield petrochemical complex in Andhra Pradesh. This will also bring huge downstream investment opportunities to the state apart from refinery and cracker units," said Ananth Kumar during the closing ceremony of the three-day CII Partnership Summit in Visakhapatnam on January 12, 2016.

The project is in addition to the ongoing brownfield expansion of HPCL refinery at Visakhapatnam, and would be set up at a different location in the state, the minister said. Establishment of a new petrochemical complex is estimated to require additional investment of more than Rs 25,000 crore. Last year, the AP government had requested the Centre to establish a greenfield petrochemical complex near Machilipatnam in Krishna district.

In addition to the petrochemical complex, Ananth Kumar also announced several projects, including a manufacturing cluster for medical devices and National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research (Niper) in Andhra Pradesh.

The AP medical devices manufacturing park, which is expected to attract Rs 20,000 crore, will be second such facility in the country after Gujarat. While Niper will be set up in Visakhapatnam with an investment of Rs 600 crore, the Central Institute of Plastics Engineering & Technology (Cipet) centre at Vijayawada will be upgraded.

Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL) is an Indian state-owned oil and natural gas company with its headquarters at Mumbai, Maharashtra and with Navratna status. HPCL has about 25% marketing share in India among PSUs and a strong marketing infrastructure. The Government of India owns 51.11% shares in HPCL and others are distributed amongst financial institutes, public and other investors.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Taiwan’s state-owned CPC Corp has restarted its No. 6 cracker on January 13 after being shut for a minor turnaround the previous day, a company source told TPS Wednesday.

It is also operating its No. 3 cracker at 100% and the No. 4 cracker is slated to restart on Jan 31, the source added.

All its crackers in Linyuan have a combined capacity of 1.08 million mt/year of ethylene as well as 500,000 mt/year of propylene.

The RFCC unit has a nameplate capacity of 450,000 mt/year of propylene.

We remind that, as MRC reported earlier, at present CPC Corp. is in negotiations with an unidentified Indonesian firm regarding the purchase and relocation of CPC's Kaohsiung, Taiwan, naphtha cracker to Indonesia.

CPC Corporation, Taiwan, is engaged in the exploration, production, refining, procurement, transportation, storage, and marketing of oil and gas. The company provides fuel oil, including automotive unleaded gasoline and diesel fuel, low-sulfur fuel oil, marine distillate fuels, marine residual fuels, and aviation fuel; petrochemicals, such as ethylene, propylene, butadiene, benzene, para-xylene, and ortho-xylene; liquefied petroleum gas products comprising liquefied petroleum gas, propane, butane, and a propane/butane mixture; lubricants, motor oil, industrial oil, grease, and marilube oil; SNC products, including petroleum ether, naphtha, toluene, xylene, crude octene, methyl alcohol, normal paraffin, viscosity-graded asphalt cement, and sulfur; and natural gas.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Production from a 50,000 tonne-per-year polyacetal plant at an affiliate of Saudi Basic Industries Corp (SABIC) will start by early 2017, said Reuters, citing a SABIC official.

Saleh al-Zahrani, senior manager polyacetal, was speaking at an industry event in Dubai.

Construction work on the plant had begun in April 2014, and production had been originally scheduled to commence by the fourth quarter of 2016. SABIC previously said that the financial impact of the project would be disclosed after the launch of commercial operations.

The project National Methanol Co., also known as Ibn Sina, is 50-percent owned by SABIC, one of the world's largest chemical companies, while Celanese Corp and an affiliate of Duke Energy Corp each have a 25 percent stake.

As MRC informed earlier, Sabic projects its 2016 costs to rise by 5%. The company expects higher costs to make an immediate impact starting from its first quarter 2016 financial results.

Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (Sabic) ranks among the worldпїЅs top petrochemical companies. The company is among the worldпїЅs market leaders in the production of polyethylene, polypropylene and other advanced thermoplastics, glycols, methanol and fertilizers.

MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Kazanorgsintez, the only polycarbonate (PC) producer in the CIS countries, still intends to put the work for the domestic market in its priority, according to MRC ScanPlast report.

To date, the rouble exchange rate is still making imported material unaffordable to small and medium-sized converters that constitute the main segment of PC granules consumers. Thus, the last year's imports of PC granules slumped by almost 40% to about 22,000 tonnes, as per our estimates.

Given the level of devaluation in Russia, it is quite logical to expect a further fall in imports and an increase in consumption of Russian PC. However, Kazanorgsintez's limited production capacity (6,000 tonnes per month) is the problem. The market will still be in need of imports during a seasonal surge in demand.

The plant's representatives said Kazanorgsintez plans to produce the maximum possible volume of PC in 2016 and to provide converters with high quality material at market prices.
MRC