A 4-cent-per-pound price hike hit North American PET bottle resin prices in May, marking the second straight month that prices for that material have increased.
Demand for PET bottle resin has improved with warm weather — which drives beverage demand — as its feedstock costs have climbed.
“The [PET] market is a little bit complicated, with the start of the peak summer beverage season and PET imports being tighter due to the ongoing anti-dumping case,” one market watcher told Plastics News.
In March, PET makers DAK Americas, M&G Group and Nan Ya Plastics Corp. asked the U.S. Commerce Department and the U.S. International Trade Commission to impose anti-dumping and countervailing duties on PET imported from Canada, China, India and Oman. The case remains under review.
The total April-May price hike was 7 cents per pound, but buyers saw multiple combinations in each month to reach that total. The April hike was 2 to 4 cents per pound. It was reported as 3 cents last month on the Plastics News Resin Pricing Chart.
The May move is being reported as 4 cents on the chart, but could be more or less, depending on how much buyers paid in April and how much more was needed to reach that 7 cent total for the two months.
It's the third straight monthly hike for the material overall, following a 1-cent increase in March. Prices had been flat in February after tumbling a total of 16 cents between November and January.
The May hike occurred even as regional oil prices started and ended the month between $60 and $61 per barrel. Prices didn't vary much during the month either, only going as low as $58 and as high as $62.