2020 Global 50 Chemical Industry: Sinopec wins runner-up

On July 27, the US "Chemical and Engineering News" (C&EN) released the list of the top 50 global chemical companies in 2020. With the spin-off of Dow DuPont, BASF regained the top spot; Sinopec won the second place, one place higher than the previous year; the third place was Dow after the spin-off.

BASF ranked first, with chemical sales of US$66.4 billion in 2019, a decrease of 5.4% compared to 2018; Sinopec’s chemical sales of US$61.6 billion, ranked second, less than US$5 billion behind BASF; Dow's sales of 43 billion US dollars, ranked third.

The companies ranked 4-10 are: Saudi Basic Industries Corporation, Ineos, Formosa Plastics, ExxonMobil Chemical, Mitsubishi Chemical, Lyondell Basel and Linde.

Six Chinese chemical companies have entered the global top 50, an increase of one over the previous year. In addition to Sinopec, Formosa Plastics ranked 6th, PetroChina ranked 13th, Hengli Petrochemical ranked 26th, China National Chemical Corporation's Syngenta ranked 29th, and Wanhua Chemical ranked 32nd.

Among the top 50 companies in the world, there are 10 in the United States, 8 in Japan, 6 in Germany, 4 in South Korea, and 2 in the UK, Belgium and France.

The top three have sales of more than 40 billion U.S. dollars and are in the leading position; 12 companies have sales of 20-40 billion U.S. dollars, ranking the second camp; 16 companies have sales of 10-20 billion U.S. dollars; the remaining 19 sales The amount is below 10 billion US dollars.

This year's ranking has not changed much. Hengli Petrochemical made the list for the first time this year, ranking 26; Dow DuPont split into Dow, DuPont and Corteva Agriscience. Among them, Dow and DuPont ranked 3rd and 14th respectively. Linde's ranking rose sharply by 11 due to the merger with Praxair and entered the top ten.

This list is based on data for the 2019 fiscal year, with a revenue threshold of $7 billion.

The list shows that global chemical economic activity is slowing, and sales and profits in 2019 have been hit. The top 50 chemical industry revenue in 2019 was 855.6 billion U.S. dollars, down 5% from the previous year.

Relative to revenue, profits have fallen even more. The 46 companies that published the data had a total profit of 71.5 billion U.S. dollars, a decrease of 28.2% from 2018. Among them, Sasol in South Africa suffered a loss, which has not been seen in the top 50 companies for many years. The reasons for the sharp drop in earnings are: international trade tensions, economic slowdown, and weakness in key markets such as the automobile manufacturing industry.

C&EN warned that these companies will face a greater recession this year. Due to COVID-19, the automotive industry completely stagnated in the second quarter, and oil prices plummeted, resulting in a significant reduction in global consumption.