China Phenol Price Unchanged at Five-Month Low; Import Volumes Set to Rise
China’s domestic phenol prices held steady this week at their lowest in five and a half months, data from Chemical Market Analytics by OPIS shows, with the resumption of imports from Saudi Arabia set to boost overall supply.
The weekly average spot phenol price in eastern China was at 6,535 yuan per metric ton ex-tank for the assessment week ended on Oct. 23, unchanged week on week, following four consecutive weeks of decline. The weekly average price was equivalent to an import parity value of about $758/mt CFR China, before antidumping duties were added.
Prices in the key downstream bisphenol-A sector, on the other hand, extended their decline. The weekly average spot BPA prices in eastern China slumped to 7,475 yuan/mt ex-tank, down by 2.3% on week to mark a fresh low since CMA records began in October 2020. According to a regional BPA producer, the all-time low for BPA was about 6,900 yuan/mt ex-tank.
Two Chinese phenol producers have planned turnarounds this month. Shandong Fuyu Chemicals is expected to restart its plant in late October or early November, following a month-long turnaround, while Formosa Chemicals Industries (Ningbo) Co. is set to begin 45 days of maintenance on Saturday, according to market sources.
Early next month, Zhejiang Petroleum and Chemical, operator of China’s largest single-site phenol production facility, plans to shut down its Phase 1 phenol plant for two weeks of maintenance, cutting its phenol supply by about 12,000 mt for the duration of the turnaround, said a market source who received a notification. ZPC’s Phase 1 BPA plant will remain operational.
In December, ZPC plans to shut down its Phase 2 phenol as well as BPA units for about 30 days of turnaround, sources said. Each of ZPC’s plants has an annual phenol production capacity of 400,000 mt and is integrated with a 240,000 mt/year BPA plant, according to CMA data. Construction of ZPC’s Phase 3 project at its Jintang Island site is ongoing. Operated under the name Rongsheng New Material (Zhoushan) Co., Phase 3 will have 400,000 mt/year of phenol production capacity and 480,000 mt/year of BPA production capacity.
Separately, ZPC, which supplies phenol by vessel from its Zhoushan site to the key Jiangyin port, is expected to shift its discharge terminal from Hengyang to Huaxi, which typically handles import cargoes, market sources said. The shift followed the U.S. Department of State’s Oct. 9 sanctions against Hengyang Petrochemical Logistics and affiliated companies for their involvement in facilitating Iranian oil trade. The terminal shift is not expected to have any material impact on domestic phenol trade, said a China-based trader.
Although lower phenol imports in recent months — partly due to the extended turnaround at Saudi Arabia’s Rabigh Refining & Petrochemical — had, according to some market participants, helped to put a floor under prices, imports are set to rise.
About 17,000 mt of Middle Eastern phenol are expected to be delivered to Jiangyin and Zhangjiagang between end-October and early-November, as OPIS earlier reported. Further deliveries from the same origin are expected to arrive over end-November to early December, and over end-December to early January, an importer said.
For the first five months of 2025, inflows from Saudi Arabia accounted for 71% of China’s total phenol imports, customs data shows. From June through September, the decrease in shipments from the kingdom drove a decline in overall import volumes. August imports fell to a year-to-date low of 7,807 mt, with no Saudi cargoes arriving that month.
Imports from Japan also came to a halt from the second quarter, with no arrivals recorded after March. Inflows totaled about 6,000 mt in February and March 2025, compared with 31,000 mt for the whole of 2024, customs data shows.
In Japan, Mitsui Chemicals is set to permanently close its Chiba facility, which has a capacity to produce 190,000 mt/year of phenol and 114,000 mt/year of acetone, by the end of this month, as OPIS previously reported.
Separately, Mitsubishi Chemical plans to scale down its production capacity during a maintenance shutdown in May 2026, market sources have said. Its plant in Kamisu, Ibaraki Prefecture can produce 280,000 mt/year of phenol and 152,000 mt/year of acetone.
In September, China imported 11,587 mt of phenol, an increase of 48% from August, customs data shows. Saudi Arabia was once more the top supplier, accounting for 49% of the inflows. From India, China also imported 61 mt, the data shows.
For the same month, China exported 4,238 mt of phenol, more than double the volumes shipped in August, according to customs data. Thailand was the top market, accounting for 71% of the outflows.
Despite the start-up of two new phenol plants in China this year — PetroChina Jilin Petrochemical and Sinopec Zhenhai Refining & Chemical — the country’s imports have seen a year-on-year increase. Imports totaled nearly 187,000 mt over the first nine months of 2025, an increase of 18% from the same period last year.
While imports rose, exports showed a year-on-year decline.
China’s phenol exports totaled 45,142 mt for the first nine months of 2025, led by shipments to India, the data shows. Over the same period in 2024, outflows reached nearly 70,000 mt, led by shipments to South Korea.
–Reporting by Trisha Huang, thuang@opisnet.com; Editing by Mei-Hwen Wong, mwong@opisnet.com