Still a lone wolf initiative, Styron Europe (Horgen / Switzerland; www.styron.com) in late June once again touted the benefits of its changed polystyrene contract price fixing – for previous coverage, see Plasteurope.com of 24.04.2012. In a press release dated 21 June, the company said it had significantly increased productivity in May, an improvement it ascribes to the early settling of the PS monthly contract.

The decision to settle the EMEA polystyrene price in the first 10 days of each month has resulted in a 50% decrease in the number of invoice adjustments in May compared to Q1 2012, Styron said, adding that when looking at the adjustments made during the previous 16 months, May’s corrections were actually down 60%.

The alleged benefits of the early contract fixing notwithstanding, Styron vice president Paul Moyer said, “We cannot make this change unilaterally. That’s why we encourage everyone in this industry to maintain the same practice in the coming months and drive productivity in the PS industry.” The initiative has so far been ignored by other leading European PS producers.