analysis of european isocyanate market price trends from march to august 2022
europe is an important isocyanate production and consumption market in the world . the isocyanate production capacity in europe (including:tdi and mdi) accounts for about 25% of the global total production capacity. at the same time, there is extensive consumption demand for isocyanate in the fields of upholstered furniture, construction and automobiles in this region. the following will analyze the price trend and influencing factors of the european isocyanate market from march to august 2022.
data source: tiantian chemical industry network
data source: public information
from march to may, the price of isocyanate products in europe showed a continuous upward trend. this is mainly due to the russian-ukrainian conflict that began at the end of february, which caused a shortage of energy supplies and price increases in european countries represented by natural gas. in addition, toluene and pure benzene are used as raw materials for the production of isocyanate products, and their prices in europe also continued to rise during this period.
from may to august, european mdi and tdi prices showed a continuous nward trend, mainly due to the decline in raw material prices , relatively sufficient supply, and the superposition of local sluggish market demand.
in terms of cost,6 from january to august, the prices of toluene and pure benzene in europe continued to fall, and it was difficult to form a strong support for the prices.
on the supply side, since the russian-ukrainian conflict broke out, the production cost of local isocyanate has been continuously pushed up, and local european tdi and mdi production facilities have been shut n or reduced in succession. although the supply of goods from europe is not optimistic, imported goods including china have made up for the local supply gap. therefore, from the perspective of the supply side, it is difficultto support the price of local isocyanate.
on the demand side, under the influence of the russian-ukrainian war, the high inflation in europe has made the local macroeconomic situation not optimistic. in this context, demand in major nstream sectors such as european upholstered furniture, construction and automotive industries continued to weaken. taking the construction industry as an example, it is reportedin july, an isocyanate company’s customer orders from the european construction industry decreased by more than half compared with the same period last year.
sinceseptember , european countries will enter winter one after another, and the energy shortage problem will become more severe after winter.. it is expected that local natural gas prices are expected to continue to rise, and the already sluggish macroeconomic situation in europe will further face severe challenges. therefore, the low isocyanate prices in this market will also lack growth momentum in the coming months.
