Formosa Plastics Group’s (FPG, 台塑集團) four major units yesterday reported higher revenue for last month compared to the previous year and month, citing better market sentiment for their products.
Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) posted revenue of NT$88.37 billion (US$2.97 billion) last month, up 24.87 percent from NT$70.77 billion for the same period last year, and up 12.5 percent from NT$78.54 billion in December, according to its filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
“We benefited from an increase in prices and sales volumes of our products last month,” company spokesman Lin Keh-yen (林克彥) said by telephone yesterday.
Prices of ethylene, propene and oil-refinery products rose last month from the previous month, Lin said.
Quantitative easing policies in some leading economies also caused capital to flow into the global oil market, pushing up prices of oil-refinery products, he said.
Furthermore, factories in the US and Middle East were conducting annual reparations, decreasing supply, he added.
While market conditions for petrochemical products in Northeastern Asia have been recovering since last month, Lin said that the company was still cautious about its prospects.
Nan Ya Plastics Corp (南亞塑膠), the nation’s largest plastics maker, saw its revenue increase 16.85 percent to NT$27.88 billion last month, from NT$23.86 billion in the same period of last year. From a month earlier, the figure represented an increase of 9.2 percent from December’s NT$25.53 billion, the company’s stock exchange filing showed.
A Nan Ya official, who declined to be named, said the increase was mainly due to strong demand for ethylene glycol, its major product, adding that the company’s supply of the product would not be sufficient to meet demand in the first quarter.
Formosa Chemicals & Fibre Corp (台灣化學纖維), which produces aromatics and styrenics, said that its revenue was NT$36.85 billion last month, up 13.14 percent from NT$32.58 billion in the same period last year, and up 4.7 percent from NT$35.19 billion a month earlier.
Company president Hong Fu-yuan (洪福源) said the increase was due to a lower comparison base last year, when the Lunar New Year holiday fell in January, as well as one of the company’s factories resuming production in January last year with limited production volume affecting revenue.
For this quarter, Hong said he expected the company would perform as well as last quarter, without elaborating.
Formosa Plastics Corp (台塑), the nation’s largest maker of polyvinyl chloride, and the flagship company of the Formosa Plastics Group, reported revenue of NT$17.88 billion last month, up 22.57 percent from NT$14.59 billion in the same period a year earlier, and up 15.6 percent from NT$15.47 billion in December.
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