Demand from Central Europe is leading the recovery of titanium dioxide market

Ed Sparks, president of titanium Technology at Comu, said a rebound in demand from China and Europe could lead to a recovery in titanium dioxide by 2023.

In the last few months of 2022, businesses downstream of titanium dioxide started to destock, Sparks said. Comu expects the downstream destocking of titanium dioxide to continue until the end of the first quarter, and market demand should recover over the rest of the year.

The mood in European markets is becoming more optimistic than it was four months ago. "What will drive an improvement in the titanium dioxide market in 2023 will be the normalisation of demand in Europe," Mr Sparks said. "In Asia, the reopening of China will provide a boost not only to the titanium dioxide market, but also to the global economy as a whole," he said. I am very optimistic about China's economic recovery and have already seen signs of a rebound in titanium dioxide demand, particularly through its distributor partners." In China, the company's titanium dioxide is used extensively in industrial and architectural coatings, Sparks said. Industrial coatings have a longer value chain, so a recovery in this end market should be evident later this year.

On the North American market, Sparks said: "The demand continuity in North America is better than in other parts of the world. This is completely different from what we are seeing in Europe and China, where demand has dropped dramatically in the last year. North American demand for titanium dioxide, used in specialty coatings, has remained strong, but the plastics market has really slowed."

Mortgage rates on 30-year home loans in the United States have fallen from more than 7 percent in November, according to Freddie MAC. The move follows a drop in sales of existing homes, which account for 80 percent of construction paint sales, as a result of rising mortgage rates. It is not clear whether this drop in interest rates will translate into increased demand for titanium dioxide. Sparks says the titanium dioxide market is stabilizing due to a lack of supply of homes for sale in the United States. There was a 2.9 month supply of existing homes in December, according to the National Association of Realtors. When the market has six months of supply, the market is in equilibrium.