Holiday week ahead: Asian market sentiment might lay calm

Though not all countries in Asia are celebrating their respective festival next week, the regional trading activities are expected to be slow due to the absence of major suppliers and buyers.

Indeed, Chinese players will officially off from 15-17 September for the mid-Autumn festival, which shortens the trading week. For this, many buyers in the country are replenishing needed cargoes at the moment before depart for their holidays. A trader informed, “We managed to conclude a good quantity of LLDPE and LDPE film todays, however not without some discounts. We think demand would continue to pick up after the holidays, as buyers only have a small window to replenish material before the National Day.” Another PP yarn converter added, “We are not keep high inventories, therefore we might need to purchase some cargoes within this week. Demand for our end product is regular for now.”

Not only Chinese buyers are away from their desks, Korean suppliers are also celebrating this important event. This is coincided with the Sacrifice Feast in Muslim countries across the globe. A Saudi Arabia producer said, “We will be off from 12 September. We have sold out our available material and might not open new offers until we resume business on 19 September.”

There has not been much movement observed in Indonesia and Malaysia market toward the end of the week with buyers in these countries seems holding back their purchases on weak end product demand. A shopping bag manufacturer in Malaysia commented, “We are still having sufficient material while end product business is rather stagnant. We might wait until after the holidays before deciding on fresh purchases.”

Most players have expressed very positive expectation for market outlook during second half of September. At the meantime, regional buyers have also addressed a number of bearish factors for the quarter 4; hence reluctant to commit large purchases.