Blog First rays of spring March 21, 2024 / April 25, 2025 by Panu Anttila Thursday 21 March 2024. – The construction-related wood panels, OSB and softwood plywood, have experienced poor demand for over a year. However, upon examining trade statistics from every continent, we observe that monthly shipping volumes have ceased declining and stabilized. In some cases, volumes are slightly improving, particularly with OSB. Simultaneously, central banks have halted […] Read more »
Blog A raw megatrend March 27, 2023 / July 9, 2024 by Panu Anttila Monday 27 March 2023. – Plywood production films from the 50s and 60s present huge logs. Human arms are too short to get around the trunks. Logs are peeled to kilometer-long veneer carpets. I bet the log size and availability go hand in hand. In the old days the wood usage was less, and the needed […] Read more »
Blog Vintage plywood from Russia February 24, 2023 / March 13, 2023 by Panu Anttila Friday 24 February 2023. – A year ago Russian troops crossed the Ukrainian border. In addition to being absurd and pointless, the war today is stuck. The demand is high for the Russian ammunition industry, but not for the plywood industry. According to Rosstat, in the last quarter before the war, Q4 2021, Russian plywood […] Read more »
Blog Spinning Jenny of plywood sales January 30, 2023 / January 30, 2023 by Panu Anttila Monday 30 January 2023. – In the 18th century, the Spinning Jenny started the industrial revolution. Compared to manual work, one worker could produce eight times more cotton fabric with this remarkable invention. At the beginning of the 20th century, plywood mills started to pop up like mushrooms in Europe and North America. The plywood […] Read more »
Blog Plywood year 2023 January 16, 2023 / January 16, 2023 by Panu Anttila Monday 16 January 2023. – Oddly enough, predicting the 2023 plywood business landscape 2023 seems easy. The overall market sentiment is unanimous. Interest rates and inflation are high. Activity slows down. Since the pandemic started in early 2020, the wood panel market has faced surprises one after another. Even if we’d see a steady decline […] Read more »
Blog 99 days to 2023 September 23, 2022 / September 23, 2022 by Panu Anttila Friday 23 September 2022. – The US housing starts jumped unexpectedly by 12.2% in August 2022 compared to July. However, the starts had dropped in July which partly explains the August recovery. The longer-term indicator, housing permits, lowered by 10% in August according to the US Commerce Department data. The annual rate in August, 1.52 […] Read more »
Blog Price control September 9, 2022 / September 9, 2022 by Panu Anttila Friday 9 September 2022. – Inflation means that things get more expensive, right? And high inflation means that things get quickly more expensive? The consumer price inflation in the USA and in the Eurozone has exceeded 8% in recent months (year-on-year). That is high compared to what we’ve been used to. According to the World […] Read more »
Blog Are crude oil and birch logs cousins? June 17, 2022 / June 17, 2022 by Panu Anttila June 17, 2022. – I guess all of us have noticed how gasoline, electricity, and food prices have increased lately. At the same time, our eyes have opened to see how massive the Russian oil exports are. And even more dramatically, how big wheat exporters both Ukraine and Russia are. If a commodity gets expensive […] Read more »
Blog New markets in Asia April 8, 2022 / July 9, 2024 by Panu Anttila April 8, 2022. – While the western trade routes fade away, the Russian authorities tell that exports will be re-directed to Asian markets. It gives a feeling like the Asians are standing still without materials, and will quickly start buying Russian products once they get the opportunity. That is hardly the case. Business deals are […] Read more »
