SNCP: Raw material price increases may have peaked

VITRY-SUR-SEINE, France—The recent spate of increases in prices for some raw materials could have peaked, new figures from the French rubber industry association, the Syndicat National du Caoutchouc et des Polymères (SNCP), suggest.

On May 1, natural rubber (solid type 5 CV) was trading at 9.5 percent above its level at the start of the year, just 0.8 percentage points above the prior month level but 13 percent higher than at the start of last year.

Last month's prices for styrene butadiene rubber solid were recorded as trading at 12.3 percent above Jan. 1 levels—down from 12.9 percent higher a month earlier but 52 percent above its Jan. 1, 2021, level.

SNCP's tracked price for oil-extended EPDM, meanwhile, was up by 14.6 points on May 1 compared to Jan. 1. Again, the level of increase was down slightly on the 18.7 percent recorded on April 1 but still 83 percent above its Jan. 1, 2021, level.

There were also slight tail-offs in the month-on-month rate of price increases for chloroprene and nitrile rubber as of May 1. These materials were trading respectively at 8.1 percent and 17.9 percent above Jan. 1 levels, though still 38 percent and 85 percent higher than on Jan. 1, 2021.

There was, however, no let-up in the surge in carbon black (>= N300) prices: 38.8 percent higher on May 1 than at the start of January—compared to 18.5 percent higher on April 1. The latest SNCP figures show prices for the reinforcing filler at 91 percent above Jan. 1, 2021, levels.