Ineos is submitting a raft of antidumping complaints over chemical imports to Europe. The chemicals group says chemicals from Asia, the Middle East and the US are improperly undercutting European manufacturers. Yet a few analysts question that the European chemical sector can be saved by latest antidumping regime.
Imports from China surged by 8% in the first half of 2025, ‘flooding Europe with carbon-rigorous products that pay a fraction of our energy expenses and no carbon price at all,’ stated Ineos in a statement important of EU action. The EU–US trade left Europe more liable to dumping, it brought.
‘Global commodity chemicals are in surplus right now,’ stated Seth Goldstein, a chemical equity analyst at Morningstar. ‘We’ve seen supply increase much quicker than demand during the past few years.’ Asia now produces57% of the world’s plastics, with China attributing for 35% – nearly 3 times more than the whole EU.
The European Commission must determine what imports constitute dumping – which means they’re being sold at artificially low costs. It can then apply precise import tariffs to individual corporations’ products to try to prevent dumping. ‘Dumping related to nations which have either a strong cost benefit or are getting authorities subsidies,’ says Goldstein. The commission took 162 anti-dumping measures, together with 62 against corporations in China, in 2024.
Ineos includes 10 crucial chemicals in its submissions to the EU. It explained them as essential to Europe’s automotive, electronic, production, packaging and pharmaceutical industries; the listing covered chemicals such as polyvinyl chloride, butyl acetate and polyolefins.
In 2024, the commission released a file 33 investigations, which include 12 within the chemical sector. Products consisted epoxy resins (utilized in composites and adhesives) from China, South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand, and thermoplastic acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS) from South Korea.
The commission decide whether goods are sold in the EU underneath their ‘normal value’, taking into account manufacturing costs, benchmarks which includes energy expenses and affordable profit margins. The commission then weighs up any damage to EU industries and determines on a percent tariff. Investigations goes on for 12 to 15 months, with initial responsibilities proposed 6–9 months after initiation, and typically finalized 3–6 months later.
It is normally better for Chinese manufacturers to deliver excess production at any cost than lead plants at lower capacity. That is when dumping becomes a problem
The commission begun out considering polyethylene terephthalate (PET) from China in March 2023. It indicated that PET manufacturers there are fully or partially state owned and advantage from government interventions, and figured a everyday PET value by regarding to Malaysian manufacturers. It imposed tariffs of among 7% and 24% on several Chinese PET manufacturers for 5 years. The commission also investigated alkyl phosphate esters from China, organic compounds used as lubricants, surfactants and flame retardants. Based on prices from Brazil, it imposed antidumping duties of 53% to 68% on Chinese imports.
Such measures aren’t sufficient, stated Ineos. European makers of ABS experienced losses equal to two-thirds of their ordinary profitability due to unfairly priced imports, it stated, and a 3.7% anti-dumping duty proposed through Brussels is just too low.
Chemicals submitted through Ineos for investigation covered monoethylene glycol (MEG), used in PET plastics and polyester textiles. US and Saudi Arabian crackers have lower manufacturing expenses and better margins for MEG, while ‘there’s an oversupply in Asia and they just would possibly need an outlet for their manufacturing,’ says Mohamed Chilmeran, petrochemical analyst at Wood Mackenzie.
Antidumping tariffs may assist short-time period prices in Europe, however we don’t believe they will assist the domestic market
It’s significant that China has built lots of cutting-edge, fully incorporated manufacturing facilities, putting a top class on working as near maximum capacity as possible. ‘It doesn’t matter if some products are negative in margins, if the overall plant is positive and that they retain working at high rates,’ says Chilmeran.
Excess manufacturing incentivizes exports, even at depressed prices. ‘If Chinese local requirement has not caught up with the new capacity,’ says Alasdair Nisbet, chief executive of Natrium Capital, a chemical industry mergers and acquisitions advisor. ‘It is normally economically good for Chinese manufacturers to put the excess manufacturing on a boat and ship it at any price than run the plant at lower capability,’ he provides. ‘That is when dumping turns into an issue.’
Some analysts criticize EU countermeasures as ineffective. In August, the commission started out an investigation into dumping of PTA (purified terephthalic acid) by using South Korea and Mexico. This ought to cause extra duties, however a some analysts doubt this would assist European manufacturers.
‘Perhaps they may assist short-time prices in Europe, however we don’t trust antidumping tariffs will assist the domestic market,’ says Santiago Castro at Wood Mackenzie. ‘The market share will shift from Mexico and South Korea, likely to China and probably Turkey.’ An Ineos PTA facility in China, or others in Asia, should still export into Europe at incredibly low prices, without always constituting dumping.
European facilities are subject to higher labour and manufacturing costs and pricier feedstocks, specially in the absence of reasonably-priced Russian gas. Numerous European crackers have closed due to competition, despite the fact that Ineos is building a brand new plant in the Netherlands, to be fed with imported US shale gas. ‘US and Middle East crackers are much inexpensive and they could export to Europe and undercut European manufacturers,’ says David Buckby, polyolefins analyst at Wood Mackenzie.
There’s not been sufficient analysis by governments into the strategic molecules that are vital for both the chemical industry and for industry as a whole
Chinese centers have lower costs and are assisted by state policies. ‘China set out on a planned strategy to dominate global supply chains and production,’ says Buckby. A lot of nations now also target to be more self-enough in chemicals, including India and Indonesia, as well as Turkey, which introduced its very own polypropylene industry. Economic logic determines that profit margins for petrochemical commodities like polypropylene and polyethylene will therefore stay poor, notes Buckby: ‘National strategic issues will override such issues in lots of places.’
The EU drew up a plan for strengthening the chemical sector in July. ‘The rhetoric sound like they’re going to take massive and meaningful action, but many fear that new regulation will be a humid squib,’ says Buckby. The EU’s trade agreement with the US in July served to darken the mood further. If permitted, it would see EU tariffs on a wide range of chemicals fall to zero from 6.5%, together with polyethylene and polypropylene. ‘The EU for the past 12-month stated it wanted to protect our chemicals industry, however lower tariffs on US chemical substances undermines this,’ says Buckby.
‘The US is no longer gambling with the regulations,’ observes Buckby, meaning it is prioritizing safety of its national industry over globalized trade. This has possibly resulted in some chemicals from Asia being rerouted from the US to Europe to keep away from new US tariffs. ‘China has not been playing by the regulations for a some time and has doubled down on its overcapacity.’ The EU needs to protect its chemical quarter, but the response is gradual and legalistic, say analysts. ‘If they want to make Europe competitive and guarded from Asian imports, rather than anti-dumping investigations, they could put [broader] tariffs on specific products,’ says Castro.
Claims of dumping are a balancing act for governments. ‘The downstream corporations that buy chemicals possibly don’t mind having a cheaper rate and that assist their business,’ says Goldstein, which means European automobile, construction and durable goods producers. ‘There is a tension right now between protecting European production from imports, encouraging a green schedule and preserving inflation down,’ says Nisbet. ‘Industry is frustrated. They bought into the green time table, which is applied to chemical products in Europe, however it’s now not always carried out to the finished goods made from chemical products,’ says Nisbet.
The situation moves quicker than politicians and civil servants in Europe and elsewhere can cope with
Many European chemical producers run distinctly incorporated plant, where byproducts from one process emerge as inputs for some other, improving efficiency and lowering value. ‘Once you begin losing individual products [through competition], it undermines the integration and the industry as an entire begins losing competitiveness,’ says Nisbet, mainly if losses from a few products can’t effortlessly be compensated by using other manufacturing. ‘There’s not been sufficient evaluation with the aid of governments into the strategic molecules which might be critical for both the chemical industry and for industry as a whole. Once you lose those molecules, your industrial base shrinks very quickly.’
Europe’s global market share in plastics fell from 22% in 2006 to 12% in 2024, with industry turnover dipping from €457 billion in 2022 to €398 billion in 2024, in keeping with trade association Plastics Europe. Profit margins on those sales were also a much smaller. ‘Europe’s decline contrasts starkly with the industrial growth taking place in different areas,’ notes Katharina Schlegel Thummer, circularity director at Plastics Europe. The industry stands ‘at a cliff edge as our competitiveness collapses,’ she adds.
Analysts anticipate that the EU will reply, however slowly. ‘The situation moves quicker than politicians and civil servants in Europe and elsewhere can address,’ says Nisbet. For now, many within the European chemicals sector are deciding to be patient. ‘If the EU doesn’t take meaningful action by the end of 2026, I think that’s when we might see any other wave of European manufacturers give up hope and close more facilities,’ says Buckby.
