Macroeconomics

1. [Federal Reserve Rate Cut] The Federal Reserve lowered the target range for the federal funds rate by 25 basis points to between 4.00% and 4.25%, in line with market expectations. This marked the first rate cut in nine months, following the December 2024 rate cut.

2. [Canadian Rate Cut] The Bank of Canada announced a 25 basis point rate cut, lowering its policy rate from 2.75% to 2.50%, its first rate cut since March.

3. [Brazil Interest Rate] On September 17th, the Monetary Policy Committee of the Central Bank of Brazil announced that it would maintain the benchmark interest rate at 15%.

4. [Eurozone CPI] The final Eurozone CPI for August increased by 2% year-on-year, compared to the previous reading of 2.1%, and by 0.1% month-on-month, compared to the previous reading of 0.2%.

5. [Japanese Exports] Japan's exports fell by 0.1% year-on-year in August, marking the fourth consecutive month of decline. The trade deficit for the month was 242.5 billion yen.

Rubber and Plastics

1. [PE] Dow announced that it is considering delaying the resumption of work on its Path2Zero project in Canada by one to two years. The project includes a new ethylene cracker and a 2 million tonnes/year polyethylene unit, as well as facilities to retrofit the existing cracker to achieve net-zero emissions. Construction was originally scheduled to begin in 2024, with a two-phase commissioning phase: the first phase would add approximately 1.28 million tonnes of ethylene and polyethylene capacity in 2027, followed by an additional 600,000 tonnes in 2029.

2. [BR] Haopu New Materials Technology Co., Ltd.'s 60,000 tonne/year high-yield butadiene rubber unit will be shut down for maintenance starting September 9, 2025, for a planned 20-day shutdown.

3. [Synthetic Rubber] According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, China's synthetic rubber production reached 740,000 tonnes in August 2025, a year-on-year increase of 7.4%.

4. [Rubber Tires] According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, China's rubber tire production reached 102.954 million units in August 2025, a year-on-year increase of 1.5%.

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