According to China Customs, China imported 135,700 tons of styrene in June 2019, with a total quantity of 1.3388 million tons in the first 6 months. The import in June fell 30,100 tons, or 18.2%, from the previous month and increased by 0.07 million tons, or 0.05%, from the same period of last year.

In 2018, though styrene import in China had a significant fall from 262,400 MT in January to 180,800 MT in February, it showed a steady growth in the next four months. And the average price in 2018 was kept above 1,300 USD/MT. While, it showed a quite a different path in the same period of 2019. The styrene volume reached a historical low of 130,850 tons in March, and then the styrene import began to rise, but it had a significant drop again in June.  And the average import price in the first six months was kept around 1,050 USD/MT, much lower than that of 2018.

(Data Source: China Customs)

Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Taiwan (China), and Kuwait are the top four styrene suppliers to China, accounting for 83.36% of the total import in June. Among them, Saudi Arabia is the largest exporter, accounting for 37.24% in the import in June, followed by Singapore and Taiwan (China) with the share at 15.48% and 15.47% respectively.

(Data Source: China Customs)

On the aspects of export, China has exported a total of 4.35 tons styrene in the first half of 2019, which is 7.41 times higher than that of last year. The styrene industry is quite profitable and is maintained at a high operation rate, together with many subsequent styrene projects are under construction, it can be expected that China will greatly reduce the styrene import and increase the export in the future.