Recently, Chemical Week of the United States released its latest ranking of the global chemical companies in the "$3 Billion Club". The ranking is based on the chemical business sales revenue of 2018.

According to the list, a total of 102 chemical companies have made it into the 2019 Global Chemical $3 Billion Club. Among them, DowDuPont, formed by the merger of Dow Chemical and DuPont, topped the list with sales revenue of 85.977 billion US dollars. Sinopec ranked second with 79.467 billion US dollars, while BASF dropped to third place with 72.04 billion US dollars in revenue.

It is noted that four coating enterprises are included in the ranking: Sherwin-Williams, PPG Industries, AkzoNobel, and RPM. Sherwin-Williams ranked 15th with revenue of 17.534 billion US dollars, PPG Industries 19th with 15.376 billion US dollars, AkzoNobel 36th with 10.639 billion US dollars, and RPM 70th with 5.566 billion US dollars.

A total of 15 Chinese companies made the list in this year’s rankings. Sinopec ranked second, Formosa Plastics Group fourth, Hengyi Petrochemical 32nd, Wanhua Chemical 45th, Hengli Petrochemical 47th, Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical 51st, Rongsheng Petrochemical 52nd, Tongkun Group 64th, North Huajin Industrial Co., Ltd. 74th, Sinochem Group 76th, Xin Fengming Group 88th, Longsun Group 95th, Kingfa Sci. & Tech. 96th, Shanghai Huayi 99th, and Yangmei Chemical 102nd.

By country, the United States had 27 chemical companies with revenues exceeding $3 billion, ranking first. Japan ranked second with 17 companies, China third with 15 companies, and Germany fourth with 10 companies.

Mergers and acquisitions continued to reshape the rankings. Apart from DowDuPont, 2018 marked the first full year of operations for Nutrien, formed by the merger of Canada’s PotashCorp and Agrium. Nutrien ranked 14th last year. After completing its acquisition of Monsanto, Germany’s Bayer posted chemical sales revenue of $16.398 billion, ranking 16th, rising 15 places compared with the previous year. Although Germany’s Linde acquired U.S.-based Praxair, it also divested a large number of businesses, causing its ranking to drop from 11th last year to 23rd this year.

In 2018, a total of 102 companies posted sales revenue above $3 billion. The average revenue of these companies rose 14% year on year to approximately $12.6 billion. The median revenue also grew steadily, up 9% year on year to $7.60 billion. Last year, 34 companies reported a decline in operating profit, while only four saw a drop in sales. The median profit margin for chemical companies stood at 11.9%, compared with 11.7% in 2017.

Last year, 107 companies qualified for the $3 Billion Club, five more than this year. The differences may be attributed to changes in corporate reporting practices, corporate restructuring, mergers, acquisitions, and divestitures. In addition, some companies with substantial chemical operations failed to make the list because they do not disclose their chemical segment sales revenue, including ChemChina, Koch Industries, Shell, TotalEnergies, and others.