Obbligazioni societarie Monitor bond Chimica Europa

[lorenzo63]

BERLIN (Dow Jones)--Daimler AG (DAI) Chief Executive Dieter Zetsche confirmed Thursday that hydrogen-powered cars should be ready for large-scale production by 2015, just after several major automakers pledged to ramp up efforts to commercialize the technology for emission-free driving.

"We will bring costs to a competitive level, prepare large-scale production and of course continue to work on the technology," Zetsche said at a press briefing in Berlin, according to a prepared statement.

At the briefing, representatives of several utilities, gas and energy companies such as Linde AG (LIN.XE), Vattenfall Group and OMV AG (OMV.VI) signed a memorandum of understanding to establish a network of hydrogen fueling stations in Germany as part of a joint initiative.

Ensuring that drivers can fill up their vehicles wherever they go is a precondition for a broader use of the technology.

But hydrogen technology still faces some prominent critics. In July, U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu said he wanted to axe funding for research and development on cars that run on hydrogen fuel cells, partly because they would require the creation of a network of fueling stations.

The U.S. government has spent roughly $1.5 billion since 2001 on hydrogen fuel-cell research. Chu argued that improved internal-combustion engines and plug-in electric vehicles were more realistic technologies for cutting oil consumption over the next 20 to 30 years.

However, Zetsche said General Motors Co., Adam Opel GmbH, Honda Motor Co. (7267.TO), Toyota Motor Corp. (7203.TO), Nissan Motor Co. (7201.TO), Renault SA (RNO.FR), Ford Motor Co. (F) and Hyundai-Kia (005380.SE) will push hydrogen technology forward, in addition to Daimler.

He said from 2015 on "several hundred thousand electric cars with fuel cells will be produced," noting that Daimler will present a hydrogen fuel cell version of its compact Mercedes-Benz B-Class model at the Frankfurt auto show next week.

Electric cars and alternative drivetrains are expected to be in the spotlight in Frankfurt as automakers feel rising pressure to make their cars more environmentally friendly amid tightening emission regulations worldwide and a growing awareness among consumers for green issues.

According to previous statements, Daimler is starting small-scale series production of the hydrogen-powered B-Class model this year. Production is expected to be around 200 cars in 2009 and pave the way for large-scale production from 2015 on.

Daimler executive board member Thomas Weber told Dow Jones in a recent interview that Daimler has so far invested around EUR1 billion in research and development costs for fuel-cell technology and pledged to keep up investing in this field.

He said by 2015 hydrogen-powered cars would have to be cost-efficient enough to attract a broader range of customers. "Customers will only buy these cars if they're just about a few thousand euros more expensive than cars with a conventional engine, but not more," Weber said.

 

[lorenzo63]

Solvay;SEPTEMBER 29, 2009, 1:30 A.M. ET FOCUS: Solvay Plans New Life As Chemicals, Pl

BRUSSELS (Dow Jones)--The sale of its cash-cow pharma unit leaves Belgium's Solvay SA (SOLB.BT) a pure chemicals and plastics player that wants to reinvent itself by investing the billions of euros it got from Abbott Laboratories (ABT) in potential high growth markets, like South America and Asia.
The company, one of Belgium's oldest, will get EUR4.5 billion cash from its deal with the U.S. drugs company. It looks set to use much of that on opening up new plants in key regions and by making acquisitions in the core chemicals and plastics arenas.

"We are building a new refocus for the group," said Chief Executive Christian Jourquin. He said Solvay intends to focus on specific regions where the potential for growth is clear, as well as on products with high added value. The conglomerate said earlier this year that demand was picking up in Asia, thanks to China, and in the four Mercosur trading bloc nations - Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay.

Solvay might have better chances to make acquisitions in plastics, while developing its own business in chemicals, said Degroof analyst Bernard Hanssens.

Plastics companies work closely with the clients to develop specific products, therefore the fastest way to grow would be through acquisitions.

In chemicals, Solvay has solid potential to expand its own production in Asia, Hanssens added.
Solvay is likely to be targeting companies which have some cutting edge technology, in areas such as components for energy solar panels, and in niche products with high margins and strong growth potential.

Speculation has already begun over which companies Solvay might target.

Belgian specialist materials company Umicore SA (UMI.BT) is a recurring name. It is a specialized, niche chemical maker, it is strong in Asia, and it has a good return on capital, noted Hanssens.

Umicore's head of investor relations Geoffroy Raskin had no comment.

Shares in Umicore gained 3.9% Monday, the day of Solvay's announcement, making them the best performers in the Bel-20 index of shares listed in Brussels. ASOlvay's stock meanwhile fell 0.1%, one of the only two negative stocks Monday.

Solvay's share price performance Monday might have reflected disappointment over the price the group got for its pharmaceuticals unit. Some analysts were expecting a somewhat higher price compared with the overall value of the pharma transaction, which the company set at around EUR5.2 billion.

Whatever the company wants to do with the money, it needs to act fast, so that it can already start bidding once it gets the cash early next year. "Every day you have the cash sitting there, you lose millions," said Fabian Wenner, an analyst at UBS.

 

[lorenzo63]

EU Seeks an Additional €50-Billion Investment in Low-Carbon Technologies

Chi potrebbe giovarne???

3:51 PM EDT | October 7, 2009 | Ian Young

European Union (EU) countries must together invest an additional €50 billion by 2020 to develop low-carbon technologies, if the EU is to meet its climate change goals, the European Commission says. The commission today called on EU member states to increase funding for green technology R&D from €3 billion/year, to €8 billion/year. The proposed investment forms part of the European Strategic Energy Technology Plan (SET-Plan), the technology pillar of the EU's energy and climate policy. Investment funding could come from the public and private sectors at national and EU level, "to be used in a coordinated way that will also help to push forward a fast growing industrial sector and create jobs," the commission says.
The commission, together with industry and the research community, has drawn up technology "road maps" under SET-Plan. The road maps identify key low-carbon technologies with strong potential at EU level in six areas: bioenergy, carbon capture and storage, electricity grids, wind, solar, and sustainable nuclear fission.
"Previous industrial revolutions have proved that the right technologies can transform for the better the way we live," says European energy commissioner Andris Piebalgs. "Today we have a unique opportunity to change an energy model based on polluting, scarce, and risky fossil fuels, into a clean, sustainable, and less dependent one. All depends on choosing the right technologies," Piebalgs says.

 

[lorenzo63]

Ancora su Solvay: firmato a Brussels...

..alla presenza del Vice Presidente Cinese una joint 50/50 con la Hutai Group per costruire plant per la produzione dell' acqua ossigenata (perossido di idrogeno) -> serve come catalizzatore, ad esempio, nella produzione di vernici acriliche... ed in tante altre reazioni di sintesi...
L' accordo è particolarmente importante ... per l'ampiezza: 20 mld euro...

Solvay and the Huatai Group have joined forces to establish a hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) production joint venture in China. The 50-50 jv, Shandong Huatai Interox Chemical Co., will build a 50,000-m.t./year H2O2 plant at a brown field site at Dongying, Shandong Province by the end of 2011. Total investment cost has been put at "less than €20 million ($29.4 million)". The jv agreement was signed in Brussels in the presence of Xi Jinping, vice president of the People's Republic of China.

Huatai, the largest news print manufacturing company in the world, already produces H2O2 with much of its output used captively. The new plant will serve both Huatai and other consumers in China, the partners say. Solvay, the global leading producer of H2O2 will provide its process technology to the jv for the production of high purity grades of H2O2 and peracetic acid. Solvay says it has developed a leading position in aseptic grades for the food and packaging industry worldwide.

"This investment will make it possible to competitively participate in this important market with a strong partner who brings good integration, both upstream and downstream, and with good support from the authorities in Dongying," says Eric Mignonat, general manager/peroxides at Solvay.

China is the largest global market for H2O2 and is expected to continue to grow fast. Other global H2O2 producers have also been expanding in China. Arkema last year completed construction of a second 40,000 m.t./year H2O2 line at Wujing in a joint venture with Shanghai Coking, a Shanghai Huayi Group subsidiary. The 80,000 m.t./year plant gave Arkema just more than 10% of the Chinese H2O2 market. The Wujing plant is expected to be further expanded to 100,000 m.t./year and Arkema is contemplating a separate world-scale H2O2 plant in China.

Mitsubishi Gas Chemical is also planning to construct an H2O2 plant in China. The plant will be based at Zhangjiagang and have capacity for 30,000 m.t./year of 100% purity H2O2

 

[lorenzo63]

Il Litio:metallo alcalino terroso per le batterie...

da seguire attentamente ....

Bolivia is planning to invest $400 million to build a lithium carbonate facility at its Uyuni salt lake lithium deposit, according to Reuters reports. The plant will have the capacity to produce 20,000 m.t./year, about 30% of global supply, and will begin production in 2014. The government wants total control over the resource and will not partner with any of the companies that have expressed an interest in the site, the government's mining director told Reuters.

Demand for lithium carbonate, a key raw material used in lithium batteries, has been growing 10%/year for applications such as cell phone and laptop batteries, producers say. The ramp-up of electric and hybrid electric car production represents a major commercial opportunity, they say. From the current base of nearly zero, sales of lithium for hybrid electric batteries are expected to exceed $500 million by 2015, analysts say.

The Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia has a base lithium reserve of about 5.5 million m.t., but political uncertainty has prevented any foreign investors from developing it, says SRI Consulting (SRIC; Menlo Park, CA). Bolivian president Evo Morales announced plans in March of 2008 to set up a state-owned lithium extraction plant on the Salar de Uyuni.

The three major lithium suppliers--Rockwood Holdings, Sociedad Quimica y Minera de Chile (SQM), and FMC--extract lithium from brine reserves in the “lithium triangle,” a series of salt flats located along the borders of Argentina, Bolivia, and Chile.

 

[lorenzo63]

Cefic General Assembly: Chemical Industry Showing 'Tentative' Signs of Recovery

The European chemical industry is showing "tentative signs of recovery" but it will take years before the industry is back to January 2008 levels, said Cefic president Christian Jourquin in his address to the Cefic 2009 General Assembly, held recently in Lisbon. "The first wave of the crisis may be softening but the second may be yet to come," he said.

Jourquin told a press conference at the assembly that the European chemical industry's capacity utilization rates vary from segment to segment but on average are running at about 70%, and many workers are still working part time as a result. This varies from country to country, he says. Many are working part time in Belgium and Germany, and the situation is even worse in southern Europe, he says.

Jourquin underlined the strong determination of the chemical industry to overcome current economic and financial difficulties. "The European chemical industry is not out of the recession yet but I have absolute faith that, provided with the right framework in which to operate, the chemical industry contains within itself the strength to overcome this challenge," he said.

One of the challenges is the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), the cornerstone of the climate change policy of the European Union (EU), which could potentially develop into an even greater burden for the European chemical industry, if at the end of the United Nations Copenhagen conference in December there are no clear and satisfactory commitments from the other participating parties. "Therefore any unilateral burden on the chemical industry in Europe will not help this region to stay competitive against emerging regions like Asia and Latin America," says Hubert Mandery, incoming Cefic director, who will take over that post on November 1.

Rhodia president Jean-Pierre Clamadieu, addressing a panel discussion, said that the chemical industry emits 2 giga m.t./year of greenhouse gases (GHG) but "our products help reduce carbon emissions by 6 giga m.t./year." The industry is continuing to improve its environmental performance, he says. Rhodia used to emit 40 million m.t./year of CO2 10 years ago but it has cut this drastically and today it emits 6 million m.t./year.

Mandery says his long-term priority as director general is to position the chemical industry as the enabling industry for a sustainable future. Shorter term, he will focus on shaping climate change policies and on making the EU's Registration, Evaluation, and Authorization of Chemicals (Reach) legislation work

 

[solenoide]

Perpetual Solvay

Ciao lorenzo63,
posso chiederti se compreresti il perpetual Solvay?
Grazie!

 

[lorenzo63]

Ciao lorenzo63,
posso chiederti se compreresti il perpetual Solvay?
Grazie!

Ciao Solenoide,

La strategia di Solvay, adesso appare chiarissima: no al pharma in quanto occorrono investimenti massicci per nuovi farmaci, con ritorni nn sempre certi a causa di: 1) la sperimentazione delle molecole/principi attivi- la quale ne seleziona (abbatte) molte, con alti costi-2)I brevetti in scadenza.
Invece, ora, è chiaro che hanno deciso di partecipare alla crescita massiccia della CIna e + in generale dei Paesi emergenti Latini ed Asiatici in generale: in effetti tutte le big del settore stanno trasferendo plant e cifre da capogiro la'...La posizione industriale adesso è ben chiara.
Anche un po' rischiosa.
Producono chimica di base es cloruro di ca - (utilizzo cementi etc,) altro esempio carb di calcio(vernici, addittivi per mat palst -rivestimenti edifici) e materie plastiche tra cui pvc, polimeri alogenati (polimeri fluorurati etc.) gas fluorurati (per aria condizionata per esempio..), sono quindi ben in grado di partecipare ad una crescita di Cina etc.
Ma l'Europa ed il primo mondo stanno rallentando (pochi soldini) quindi in prospettiva devono puntare sul mercato interno .... e non mi sembra che all' attuale sia chissà cosa, anche dopo gli investimenti del Governo Cinese-che tra l' altro si è parecchio arrabbiato perchè gli stimoli dati, sono finiti in speculazione., anche se in previsione necessariamente evolverà, ma non senza qualche scossone.
Inoltre vi è da osservare anche questa particolarità: è una ripresa questa, senza gambe, perchè la disoccupazione è in aumento, (a causa delle continue delocalizzazioni) e del mancato stimolo all' economia reale (salvate le banche poi??) quindi stante che, almeno dal mio osservatorio, i prezzi di diverse commodity (non ora ma nei prossimi mesi) sono date al ribasso .. è facilmente immaginabile che ci siano ripercussioni anche sulle quotazioni, che presumo, di questi strumenti siano particolarmente volatili. Ma è solo una ipotesi, corroborata da qualche occorrenza di rilievo, ma solo un' ipotesi.

Il discorso è relativo proprio alla particolarità delle perpetuals:ho letto nel prospetto che possono non pagare gli interessi (anche se è prevista tutta una trafila di vendita/emissione di azioni per cercare di soddisfare il mancato pagamento..)senza dare default..
Francamente Solenoide, ed in tutta onestà non saprei... .. In realtà questa mia posizione è forse data proprio da una mia certa avversione al rischio (l' unica mia perp - rivenduta- fu ISP)

 

[solenoide]

Ciao e grazie per la tua esauriente risposta.
Il perpetual Solvay ha buone clausole ma come hai ben chiarito si prospettano tempi non facili.
Per ora mi limito a tenerlo monitorato

 

[lorenzo63]

Notevole variazione (non come valore assoluto per singolo titolo, ma come variazione globale) in negativo dei corsi: su 35 titoli osservati, ben 26 sono negativi rispetto alla scorsa settimana, 4 positivi, 4 invariati; E' stata aiunta l' emissione di K+S 25/9/2009 - 24/9/2014 5%, rating SP BBB di cui nn ho le quotazioni della scorsa week.

Complessivamente movimenti nn ampi, ma comunque per numero rilevanti, anche se, credo, si deve aspettare una o due settimane per capire un po' meglio: Comunque visti in modo unitario ai movimenti di prezzo già segnalati sulle mp, il quadro che si presenta è stato di un recupero forte dei corsi cui non corrisponde per ora una adeguata solidità dei mercati di vendita.

Vedi l'allegato Chemical Bonds 3.xls