Shortly after the exorbitantly high fixing of the styrene contract for March 2021, several resin producers have announced price hikes. The reasons given for each of these hikes were strong surcharges for almost all raw materials, additional bottlenecks due to forces majeures and high freight costs.

With immediate effect, AOC (European headquarters: Schaffhausen / Switzerland; www.aocresins.com) is increasing prices for unsaturated polyester (UPR), vinyl ester resins and related products by EUR 350/t to EUR 450/t in the EMEA region. Simultaneously, Polynt (Scanzorosciate, Bergamo / Italy; www.polynt.it) also announced that it would be raising prices, but did not provide any figures, even when questioned by Plasteurope.com. It can, however, not be doubted that the increases by Polynt would be of similar magnitude.

From 6 March onward, competitor Interplastic (St. Paul, Minnesota / USA; www.interplastic.com) is also raising prices globally by USD 265/t (EUR 220/t) for vinyl ester resins. Unsaturated polyester resins get off comparatively lightly, with an increase of EUR 90/t.

Allnex (Frankfurt / Germany; www.allnex.com), which focuses primarily on resin products for coatings, initially quoted a hike of EUR 300/t as the target for UPR in the EMEA region, but at the same time warned that there could be further mark-ups, depending on the supply region.