Epoxy
March 21, 2023
Olin Closing Epoxy Facilities
Olin Announces Epoxy Facility Closures as Part of On-Going Restructuring Program
Mar. 21, 2023 4:05 PM ETOlin Corporation (OLN)
CLAYTON, Mo., March 21, 2023 /PRNewswire/ — Olin Corporation (NYSE: OLN) announced today that it has made the decision to cease operations at its Cumene facility in Terneuzen, Netherlands and solid epoxy resin production at its facilities in Gumi, South Korea and Guaruja, Brazil. Olin’s first quarter 2023 results are forecast to include approximately $57 million of restructuring charges associated with these plans of which approximately $15 million of these restructuring charges represent non-cash asset impairment charges. The cash component of these charges is expected to be paid over the next three years.
“This is another step to right-size our global Epoxy asset footprint to the most cost-effective asset base to support our strategic operating model,” remarked Scott Sutton, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer. “Our Epoxy business continues to experience weak global epoxy demand and excess supply availability. This action reinforces our commitment to lift our Epoxy business earnings to a more sustainable level. We will continue to evaluate and execute additional actions that right-size the business to achieve reinvestment economics across our Epoxy portfolio.”
March 21, 2023
Auto Sales Rebound in January
March 14, 2023
Univar Solutions Going Private
Univar Solutions to be Acquired by Apollo Funds for
$8.1 Billion
3/14/2023
Shareholders to Receive $36.15 Per Share in Cash
DOWNERS GROVE, Ill. and NEW YORK, March 14, 2023 /CNW/ — Univar Solutions Inc. (NYSE: UNVR) (“Univar
Solutions” or the “Company”) and Apollo (NYSE: APO) announced today that funds managed by affiliates of Apollo
(the “Apollo Funds”) have entered into a definitive merger agreement to acquire the Company in an all-cash
transaction that values the Company at an enterprise value of approximately $8.1 billion. The transaction includes a
minority investment from a wholly owned subsidiary of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (“ADIA”).
The agreement provides that Univar Solutions shareholders will receive
$36.15 per share in cash, which represents a 20.6% premium to the Company’s
undisturbed closing stock price on November 22, 2022. The transaction
consideration also represents a premium of 33.6% to the volume-weighted average price of Univar Solutions for the
30 trading days ending on November 22, 2022.
“We are pleased to have reached this agreement with Apollo, which will provide immediate and certain cash value
for Univar Solutions shareholders,” said Chris Pappas, chairman of the Univar Solutions Board of Directors (the
“Board”). “The Board’s decision follows a comprehensive review of value creation opportunities for Univar
Solutions. We are conêdent this transaction is the right path forward and achieves our goal of maximizing value for
Univar Solutions shareholders.”
David Jukes, president and chief executive officer of Univar Solutions, said, “Over the last three years, we have
transformed the Company, putting the customer at the center of all we do, which has solidified our position as a
leading value-added service and solution provider. This transaction reflects the success of our strategy and delivers
substantial value to our shareholders. It is a testament to the tireless efforts of my colleagues, whose commitment
to our purpose of helping keep our communities healthy, fed, clean, and safe has enabled our success.
In Apollo, we are pleased to gain a partner to support continued investment in our portfolio and I look forward to working
closely with their team as we grow Univar Solutions and serve our key suppliers and customers globally.”
Apollo Private Equity Partner Sam Feinstein said, “Univar is a global leader in specialty chemicals and ingredients
distribution, fueling a vast array of industries with innovative, safe and sustainable solutions. In recent years, David
and his team have made tremendous progress enhancing the customer experience, and we believe Univar can
accelerate its long-term strategy as an Apollo Fund portfolio company. We look forward to leveraging our extensive
experience in the sector to support management in this exciting next phase.”
Transaction Details
The merger agreement, which has been unanimously approved by the Univar Solutions Board of Directors,
provides that Univar Solutions shareholders will receive $36.15 in cash for each share of common stock they own.
The transaction will be enhanced with equity provided by the Apollo Funds, a minority equity investment from a
wholly owned subsidiary of ADIA and a committed debt ênancing package.
The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2023, subject to customary closing conditions, including
approval by Univar Solutions shareholders and receipt of regulatory approvals. The transaction is not subject to a
ênancing condition.
Upon completion of the transaction, shares of Univar Solutions common stock will no longer trade on the New York
Stock Exchange, and Univar Solutions will become a privately held company. Univar Solutions will continue to
operate under the Univar Solutions name and brand and maintain a global presence.
The foregoing description of the merger agreement and the transactions contemplated thereby is subject to, and is
qualified in its entirety by reference to, the full terms of the merger agreement, which Univar Solutions will file with
the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as an exhibit to a Current Report on Form 8-K.
March 3, 2023
Epoxy Highlights from Westlake Investors Call
Westlake Corporation (WLK) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript
Feb. 21, 2023 2:46 PM ETWestlake Corporation (WLK)
Q4: 2023-02-21 Earnings Summary
EPS of $1.86 misses by $0.43 | Revenue of $3.30B (-5.93% Y/Y) misses by $111.98M
Westlake Corporation (NYSE:WLK) Q4 2022 Results Conference Call February 21, 2023 11:00 AM ET
Company Participants
Jeff Holy – Vice President & Treasurer
Albert Chao – President and Chief Executive Officer
Steven Bender – Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer
Roger Kearns – Chief Operating Officer and Executive Vice President, Performance and Essential Materials
Albert Chao
Thank you, Jeff. Good morning, everyone. We appreciate you joining us to discuss our fourth quarter and full year 2022 results. For the full year of 2022, we reported record net income of over $2.2 billion or $17.34 per share and record EBITDA of $4.2 billion on record sales of $15.8 billion.
While 2022 was a record year, it was also a challenging year as we experienced energy volatility, rapidly rising interest rates, evolving COVID policies impacting Asian demand and market dislocations due to the war in Ukraine. As these obstacles evolved and drove more difficult economic conditions in the second half of the year, Westlake took proactive actions to navigate a slower GDP growth with cost savings initiatives.
These broad-based 2022 initiatives included reductions in overhead and energy costs, synergies from acquisitions and investments in digital and automation that lowered our cost by approximately $50 million and also drove operational efficiencies. Thanks in part to these actions and despite the challenging external environment. For a second consecutive year, we achieved records for sales, EBITDA and net income, with EBITDA almost doubling from the previous cycle high in 2018.
I want to take a few minutes to review several of our major accomplishments in 2022. We generated record cash from operations of $3.4 billion. This significant level of cash flow allowed us to return $270 million to investors in the form of dividends and share repurchases, retire $250 million in debt, deploy $1 billion to improve the reliability of our plants and grow our production capacity to meet customers’ needs, close $1.4 billion in acquisitions and grow our ending cash balance by $300 million.
The evolution and integration of our business continued in 2022 as we closed the Epoxy acquisition and increase our ethylene integration with the additional investment into our LACC Ethylene joint venture. Integrating these businesses into Westlake, as we have with Boral, DASCO and Dimex acquisitions which closed in 2021, drove synergies in 2022.
This evolution of our business spurred the changing of our name from Westlake Chemical to Westlake Corporation, which better represents the significant breadth of the products we produce and industries we serve. Decarbonizing our assets and drive sustainability remain important initiatives and growth opportunities for Westlake. As part of our sustainability efforts, we established a carbon reduction goal to reduce our Scope 1 and Scope 2 emission intensity by 20% by 2030.
Albert Chao
Thank you, Steve. During the fourth quarter, we saw deteriorating economic conditions that led to inventory destocking, resulting in lower demand for our products in well-supplied markets. Since year-end, we have seen modest improvements early in the first quarter in demand for polyethylene and PVC with improving feedstock and energy costs providing some margin tailwinds.
The large market for epoxy in Asia and Europe reflect sluggish demand as China begins its economic recovery and Europe continues to address its own economic and energy challenges. Looking ahead, while uncertainties remain in the macroeconomic outlook, we believe there are some positive trends appearing.
Energy costs have improved, particularly in Europe, albeit still at elevated levels. Forecast for U.S. housing starts ranging from 1.1 million to 1.3 million units over the next two years, which will be a 20% decline from the 2021, 2022 levels.
Even with the strength in housing construction that occurred over the past two years, annual new housing construction largely remained below the 50-year average of 1.5 million units. Therefore, we continue to have a deficit from underbuilding that occurred since 2007.
Duffy Fischer
Good morning. First question is just around the Epoxy acquisition. You’re kind of a year into it now. It’s been at the tough year here. So, can you do an after-action review? I mean, does the industry need to have some structural change? Does your business need to have some structural change? Or is this just really kind of a bad supply-demand setup right now that will fix itself over the next couple of years?
Roger Kearns
Yes. Thanks, Duffy, it’s Roger. Maybe a couple of comments there. I think Epoxy business for our first year, we started extremely strong. The first part of the year was a very strong part of the business. But as we move through the year, it certainly got weaker.
And by the end of the year, I would say the fourth quarter was really quite weak. I think there’s a couple of things as we look forward. We have seen China announced already in ’23 nearly a doubling of the wind energy installations over ’22. So, we’ll have to watch and see how that plays out.
But that should be kind of a nice boost in the markets. As you know, there’s — I mean, there’s a limited number of Western players. We’ll continue to do what we do, which is make our plants run more efficiently, more cost effective.
We’ll copy our Westlake model into those sites. So, I think there’s some self-help work we’ll do, but hopefully as well with aviation, automotive and some wind energy picking up a little bit in ’23, we can get the ’23 looking better than certainly the end of ’22.
Duffy Fischer
Fair enough. And then the stat or the projection you threw in there on remodel and repair at 2.6% for the year, one, is you’re just talking to your customers as you’re looking at your order book, does that feel like kind of the right number? And then maybe like a follow-on to the last question, if that ends up being the right number, how does that look first half versus second half do you think?
Steven Bender
So, Duffy, it’s Steve. And I would say that the tone that we saw at the builder show recently was constructive, and I think it aligns with the tone that we saw from those that visited the builder show. And certainly, there is some expectation that will continue on as we go forward. Typically, when housing starts slow, repair and remodeling show strength.
And so, there is a typical investment cycle that homeowners always undertake. And that is they’re either improving their home either to sell to move forward or improving their home because affordability to move on to a new home is too expensive.
So, we do think that, that aligns with the tone we’re hearing from our customers and consistent with the contributions we think it will make to the business over the course of ’23.
Jeffrey Zekauskas
Okay. My follow-up, there was the vinyl chloride release in Ohio. Do you think that, that has implications for the chlorovinyl industry? Or do you think that, that will lead to some kind of change? Or do you have any general comment?
Albert Chao
Yes. I think people are waiting for the surface transportation safety board come back with the report. I’m sure there’ll be more government regulation on railroads and possibly on the shippers on safety.
These are very important products that ship around the country. So, the demand has to be satisfied. But definitely, we need to increase the safety by the variables primarily. I will think on the equipment, some of them getting old, and we heard new technologies out there to improve the safety aspect of the railroads.
Eric Petrie
Thank you, Albert. And then maybe a question for Roger on your comment of the doubling of installations in China. What does that do to kind of supply-demand balances in the country? And then how much capacity is China adding this year and kind of what needs to be absorbed from last year?
Roger Kearns
Yes. So, I think wind in China is — China is a big driver of the wind market. And so, they’ve got RFQs out there, say, about double this year what they’ve done last year. That’s a good first step, I think, in really starting to absorb the extra capacity that’s come in as well as avoid the exports, right?
So as Albert mentioned, with the China domestic market so slow, the China producers are exporting significant amounts. I think that will turn back inside and be used in China as opposed to hitting the export markets.
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4580333-westlake-corporation-wlk-q4-2022-earnings-call-transcript
February 28, 2023
New Epoxy Line From PPG
PPG launches an epoxy fire protection coating
MOSCOW (MRC) — PPG announces the launch of PPG STEELGUARD 951 coating, an innovative epoxy intumescent fire protection coating designed to meet the demands of modern architectural steel, including up to three hours of cellulosic fire protection, said the company.
In a fire situation, the coating expands from a thin, lightweight film into a thick, foam-like layer that insulates the steel and maintains its structural integrity, providing more time for people to escape and limiting damage to buildings and assets.
PPG STEELGUARD® 951 coating also provides effective corrosion protection for very corrosive atmospheric environments up to ISO 12944 C5 without the need for a topcoat, which also reduces project time and costs to achieve results. It can provide up to 3,500 microns dry film thickness in a single coat and cures rapidly, making it ready to handle the day after application.
“Structural steel plays a critical role in modern architecture by enabling buildings to meet specific fire protection and corrosion resistance according to their function,” said Richard Mann, PPG global product manager, passive fire protection, Protective and Marine Coatings.
“PPG Steelguard 951 coating is unique in combining an aesthetically pleasing finish with high corrosion protection and, most importantly, the ability to maintain the steel’s stability in the event of a fire,” added Mann.
We remind, PPG will invest USD11 million to double the production capacity of its powder coatings plant in San Juan del Rio, Mexico. The expansion project is expected to be completed by mid-2023 and will allow the plant to meet the expected future demand for powder coatings in Mexico.
PPG is a leading supplier of powder coatings to the automotive, transportation, appliance, furniture and other markets. The company expanded the business with its 2020 acquisition of Alpha Coating Technologies, which manufactures powder coatings for light industrial applications and heat-sensitive substrates, and its 2021 acquisition of Worwag, which makes liquid, powder and film coatings for industrial and automotive applications. PPG recently agreed to acquire the powder coatings business of Arsonsisi, including a manufacturing plant in Verbania, Italy.
https://www.mrchub.com/news/406444-ppg-launches-an-epoxy-fire-protection-coating
Everchem Updates Archive 
Sign Up for Email Updates