Reliance Industries, the world's largest refiner, has restarted a 330,000 barrels per day crude distillation unit (CDU) on Monday following a shutdown last week for maintenance, traders said. The privately-run refiner operates two refineries in Jamnagar on the Arabian Sea with a total capacity of 1.24 million barrels per day (bpd). The CDU which was shut last week was located in the older, 660,000 bpd refinery. "The shutdown should have taken place before it sold a June naphtha cargo la

Ecuador's first quarter crude oil export revenue fell 4% from a year earlier to $3.38 billion due to lower oil prices, the central bank said Monday. The average price of crude in the three months fell 5% to $99.16 a barrel. By volume, Ecuador exported 34.14 million barrels in the first three months of 2013, up 1%. Crude oil is Ecuador's main export. All the oil is exported by Ecuador's state-owned companies. The central bank also said Ecuador produced 45.55 million barrels of crude oil fo

The backwardation structure in the Asian paraxylene market narrowed to $2/mt Thursday from $5/mt Wednesday as front-month laycans were seen to be weaker than back-month and amid heavy spot PX selling by Chinese purified terephthalic acid producers, Platts data showed. Early Friday, the structure was seen to turn flat, reflecting the latest H2 June/July spread bid and offers. Thursday night, a bid for H2 June/July was heard at minus $2/mt on a CFR basis, indicating the market is in contango, whi

Konica Minolta, Inc. (Konica Minolta) will be unveiling for the first time a new inkjet textile printer, the Nassenger PRO120, at ShanghaiTex 2013, an international textile and garment machinery exhibition to be held at Shanghai, China, from June 10 through June 13. As the third model in the Nassenger PRO series, the new, high-performance Nassenger PRO120 has the maximum print speed of 120m2 per hour, twice as fast as that of the popular model, the Nassenger PRO60 introduced last year. Equippe

Huntsman Textile Effects, a division of Huntsman Corporation and a leading global provider of high quality dyes and chemicals to the textile and related industries launched PHOBOL CP-DP and PHOBOL CP-DL fluoropolymers. This new dual action system is the latest innovation from the Huntsman and DuPont Textile Alliance to further industry-leading initiatives to transition to short-chain chemistry. The Huntsman and DuPont Textile Alliance was the first to launch the Dual Action (repel and relea

F&F, the clothing range sold by British supermarket chain Tesco, is taking off to expand in the Middle East, as Tesco just announced. F&F has unveiled plans to open more than fifty new franchise stores over the next five years in new markets across the Middle East and in Kazakhstan, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. "We've had a strong year and our combination of good quality and contemporary design appeals to customers across the world. I'm excited to see F&F moving into these new m

Next’s group property director Andrew Varley is to step down from his position with the high street retailer next year after 27 years. Varley will retire from Next in June next year but will also step down from the board on May 31 this year. In a statement Next said: “Andrew’s departure next year does not represent a change to the strategy of the business; the profitable expansion of our trading space remains a key part of the Group’s plans going forward.” During his time at Next Varley has h

Global superstar Rihanna is suing British fashion retailer Topshop for 5 million US dollars for selling t-shirts bearing her image without her consent, it has emerged. According to the New York Post, Rihanna’s team has been trying to negotiate with Topshop owners Arcadia Group for the past eight months regarding the rights to her image, though these talks broke down after the retailer offering the popstar a 5,000 US dollars settlement. The t-shirt in question was on sale at Topshop at the end o

Abercrombie & Fitch chief executive officer Mike Jeffries has come under fire recently for comments he made (several years ago) regarding the store's sizing policy and effort to market to only "good-looking people." Abercrombie doesn't sell a size bigger than "large" for women. Here's what he said: “In every school there are the cool and popular kids, and then there are the not-so-cool kids. Candidly, we go after the cool kids. We go after the attractive all-American kid with a great attitud

Blame it on my Seattle grunge-girl roots, but I typically gravitate toward edgier fashion designers and steer clear of the pretty and romantic, which means you won't find a lot of lace or velvet in my closet. That was before I saw Dior designer Raf Simons' cruise collection, which hit the runway at Monaco's Hotel de Paris on Saturday night. It was full of lace-y moments that are anything but precious. I predict we will see Jennifer Lawrence (face of Miss Dior) on the red carpet very soon in