Trinseo SR business' earnings more than halved in Q2

Berwyn, Pennsylvania – Materials supplier Trinseo SA has seen second quarter earnings (adjusted EBITDA) within its synthetic rubber (SR) unit drop 57.8% year-on-year to $13 million, due to lower sales volumes and weak market conditions.

Sales fell 28% to $112 million (€100 million) in the three months to end of June, due mainly to lower solution styrene butadiene rubber (SSBR) and emulsion styrene butadiene rubber (ESBR) sales volumes and currency impacts.

Volumes were down roughly 11% quarter-over-quarter, 18% year-over-year, as a result of weakness in the global tire market, Trinseo announced in a 9 Aug financial statement.

Commenting on the results, Trinseo president and CEO Frank Bozich said the decline in volumes reflected the decreases witnessed in the automotive industry.

“The global branded tire producers have been relatively flat, it's the commodity tire markets that have been hurt more significantly,” he said during a conference call.

The “non-performance tire market”, according to Bozich, is where Trinseo’s ESBR technology would typically go.

The company’s SSBR volume has been relatively stable and held up, as it is destined for performance tires, Bozich added.

“I'd say that we would see performance tires that utilise SSBR technology growing… much faster than the broader tire market in the future,” he concluded.